Accra, Aug.7, GNA - President John Agyekum Kufuor on Thursday cut the sod for work to begin on the 5.1 kilometres Teshie By-pass estimated at 14.8 Billion cedis.

The project being financed jointly by the International Development Agency (IDA) of the World Bank and the government and being undertaken by MANET Construction, local contractors, would help to ease the traffic congestion on the main Accra-Tema Beach Road.

Speaking at the ceremony, which formed part of President Kufuor's four-day tour of the Greater Accra Region, he commended the chiefs and people of Teshie for the unity that now prevailed in the town after they had solved the long-standing chieftaincy dispute that had affected socio-economic development in the area.

He said it is a worthy example to be copied by other chiefs and people in the country where chieftaincy and land disputes had affected their development, adding "that the chiefs and people of Teshie had at long last decided to smoke a peace pipe should make all of us proud and I congratulate you for that gesture".

President Kufuor announced that a separate Sub-Metropolitan Area had been created for Teshie and urged the chiefs to involve competent officials from the Town and Country Planning to zone the area in order to add value to their land and generate more revenue for development. He said a landing beach for fishermen in the area would be constructed next year and appealed to the contractors to speed up their operations to complete the project on schedule.

President Kufuor said the Ghana Water Company (GWC) would provide water tanks as an interim measure to provide potable water to the people until a permanent solution was found to their water problem. Nii Adjei Otsweima II, Teshie Mankralo in a welcome address appealed to the government for assistance to solve their acute water problem.