Government’s initiative to decongest and sanitize the sky spaces of the Ghana’s big cities through billboards demolitions, has had to be slowed down for a while due to concerns raised by the Advertising Association of Ghana (AAG). AAG held a press briefing on Tuesday 17th March to clarify the industry’s position on the demolition exercise.
The Ministry of Local Government, Chieftaincy and Religious Affairs set up a committee in October, last year, with the mandate to roll out decongestion exercises across the country to sanitise the sky spaces of big cities due to the proliferation of billboards. The committee began its work by marking billboards within four municipal assemblies in Accra (La Dade-Kotopon, Korley-Clottey, Ayawaso West and the Accra Metropolitan Assembly). The marking exercise was followed by some demolition exercises, which have been met with a great deal of resistance from the AAG.
In AAG’s press briefing, the President of the association, Andrew Ackah, stated that although AAG has been at the forefront of calling for decongestion and regularisation of the outdoor sector, it is questioning questioned government as to why advertising industry players were not engaged before the demolitions began. Another concern of the AAG, according to the President, was that there was no clear and transparent plan communicated to relevant stakeholders and industry players. According to AAG, the association has a better plan that would make the demolition and decongestion exercise much easier for the government.
As a result of AAG’s push-back, two key events have happened: (1) The Greater Accra Regional Minister whose office was blamed for the demolition sent a press statement indicating that the recent demolition exercise was not carried out by the regional ministry; (2) The deputy minister for the Ministry of Local Government, Chieftaincy & Religious Affairs, together with the decongestion and demolition committee called for an official engagement with AAG. The deputy minister, who chairs the committee assured the AAG delegation that the issues raised by the association will be considered.
