The Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Collins Dauda, has assured that government will rebuild the Asawasi community centre, in the Ashanti Region, days after nine people died in a stampede there.
This follows a request by the Chief of the Zongo community, Alhaji Umar Farouk Sultan.
The nine people died in a stampede during a jam to climax the Eid-ul Fitr celebration in the area last Wednesday.
At a gathering of members from the Zongo community in the Asokore Mampong Municipality, the President of the Zongo community, Alhaji Musa Akabonga, on behalf of Sarkin Zongo, noted that the request was needed to prevent future unforeseen occurrences, explaining that, “this community center cannot take even up to 300 people, but I believe what happened was because of the over crowding. So the request made by Sarkin Zongo on our behalf is a request made at the appropriate time.”
Mr. Collins Dauda assured that an ultramodern centre would be established by government to replace the old one.
Alhaji Musa expressed his pleasure at the acceptance of the request, and asked that government duly fulfills the promise.
“We are grateful to Collins Dauda who represented the President of the Republic, who has gladly accepted the request in good faith and promised that they will do same for us. We are hoping that the promise will be fulfilled.”
The stampede according to the Asokore Municipal Security Council, was caused by a faulty electricity meter which sparked after the close of a musical program organized by ‘Kayeyes’ around 2:00am Thursday morning.
The Asawasi community center has since been closed down by the Asokore Mampong Municipal Assembly to allow for further investigation.
–
By: Lauretta Timah/citifmonline.com/Ghana