Bejamse (VR), April 11, GNA - Obrimpong Kanya II, Chief of Bejamse-Nchumuru in the Krachi-West District, has renewed calls on the government to consider splitting the Volta Region into two and suggested the northern districts of the region should be named North-Volta Region He said planning, monitoring and evaluating development projects for the region with its current boundaries was burdensome and had left the northern half of the region underdeveloped in all respects. Obrimpong Kanya was addressing a durbar to climax the Sonkor festival of the chiefs and people of the Bejamse-Nchumuru Traditional Area at the weekend.

He said the long-standing request for the North-Volta Region had been reinforced by the creation of the Krachi-East District, which would join Krachi-West, Nkwanta, Kadjebi and Jasikan districts. Obrimpong Kanya called on the government and its decentralised arms to ensure that contracts for road rehabilitation were done to specification.

Sonkor festival commemorates the "end of the bondage of yearly payment of slaves to the Ashanti Kingdom in the early 19th century.'' The festival that is marked with the pacification of the ancestral god "Sonkor" for its guidance over the years has now been transformed into a period for planning development of the area.

Obrimpong Kanya said the people through self help, support of some NGOs and the district assembly, had built a kindergarten, rehabilitated a colonial rest house for a health post, cleared the lakeside of tree stumps to serve as landing site for vessels and constructed a road to facilitate carting of foodstuffs to the lakeside.

He appealed to the government to build a permanent landing site for vessels, absorb the Nchumuruman Senior Secondary School, now managed by the Church of Pentecost, into the public system and provide more boreholes to curb guinea worm infestation in the area.

Obrimpong Kanya also appealed to the government to extend the President's Special Initiative on cassava and tractor services, similar to what operates in the Northern Region, to the area.

Mr Joseph Nayan, the Deputy Volta Regional Minister, commended the chiefs and people of the traditional area for their initiative in starting many development projects.

He said the issue of a separate region for northern Volta was a constitutional one with an elaborate process that takes time to mature. Mr Nayan, who is Member of Parliament (MP) for Nkwanta-North, counselled the people in the area not to take peace for granted but work for it.

He said road construction would remain a priority area in the second four-year term of President John Agyekum Kufuor. Mr Nayan said steps were being taken to absorb the Nchumuruman SSS into public system and also promised that tractor services would be extended to the area if they met the terms.

He said the President's Special Initiative on cassava had been extended to the Krachi District and would soon reach the traditional area.