HIGH RENTS IN WA AFFECT WORKERS, STUDENTS (PAGE 20)

GONE are the days when rooms and bungalows in the Wa municipality were left at the mercy of the weather without being rehabilitated or unoccupied.
That was the period when the region was regarded by many, especially people from the southern part of the country as “a no-go area”, and workers refused transfers to the region.
As a result, many of the bungalows constructed by successive governments, especially during the regime of the late General I.K. Acheampong were not occupied because the population of workers, particular those in the formal sector at the time, was nothing to write home about.
It is worth mentioning that the situation has now changed as far as accommodation in Wa is concerned. This development has resulted in the exorbitant and unrealistic rents charged by some unsympathetic landlords and landladies.
This does not mean that all the landlords and landladies are unreasonable and following the footsteps of their compatriots who want to become rich overnight. Some of them feel for others and for that matter, charge very reasonable rents depending on the nature of their rooms.
Some landlords who own compound houses charge as much as GH¢300 per student of the University for Development Studies (UDS) for one single room, which is rented out to four people. For students who prefer some comfort and luxury, they have to be prepared to dish out between GH¢600 and GH¢800 before they get decent accommodation.
Such is the situation in the Wa municipality presently. Unfortunately, indigenous contractors who in one way or the other want to reverse the trend by putting up low-cost buildings have not done so.
However, thanks to the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund), hostel facilities have been constructed for the two main tertiary educational institutions in the municipality, the Wa campus of the University for Development Studies (UDS) and Wa Polytechnic. Unfortunately, work on some of the hostels is progressing at a snail’s pace, which sometimes forces students and workers to rub compete for private accommodation in town.
It is sad to note that although the Wa municipality was included in the government’s affordable housing programme to ease the burden of workers, the site for the project, which is on the Wa-Dorimon road, is still lying untouched, long after Mr Hackman Owusu Agyeman, the then Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, had cut the sod for the project in 2007.
Interestingly, barely a year after the sod-cutting ceremony, his successor, Alhaji Boniface Abubakar Saddique also visited Wa and gave the assurance that the project would begin in June, 2008 but this did not happen.
Meanwhile, investigations by the Daily Graphic has revealed that the land meant for the project and that of the permanent campuses of the Wa campus of the UDS, is yet to be properly documented and this has led to agitation by the landlords.
To avoid some of the mistakes in other parts of the country, especially Accra, the nation’s capital, there is the need for all interested parties to go to the negotiation table to thrash out any bottlenecks before it is too late.
It is also the prayer of all residents and visitors to Wa and the Upper West Region in general, that private investors would focus their attention on the region and invest in the provision of accommodation since Wa has developed dramatically.
It is also the wish of all and sundry that some of the indigenous people who are engaged in the construction business and those who have not thought of venturing into that area, would be encouraged to give it a second thought in order to ease the accommodation problems in the region.
This has become imperative as an increase in comfortable accommodation will encourage many people including workers and students to move to the Wa municipality in particular and the region in general.