By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Garden City, New York
Dec. 12, 2015
E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The problem of speeding motorists is a global problem, though one naturally imagines the deadly dimension of this problem to be more acute in the less technologically advanced countries or the Third World, so-called. The recent inauguration of a completed footbridge near the sprawling campus of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Kumasi, naturally came as good news. What pained me quite a bit, however, was the fact that it had to take the generosity of the Austrian government to get the project successfully undertaken and completed (See “KNUST Footbridge Inaugurated” Graphic.com.gh / Ghanaweb.com 12/12/15).

We are also told that the KNUST Footbridge is one of only four pedestrian bridges under construction in the country, with all three other bridges located with the Accra metropolis. One does not need to travel the entire length and breadth of the country to recognize the need for legion pedestrian bridges all over the country, and in both towns and villages. The fact of the matter is that since the government cannot afford to construct pedestrian walkways wherever they may be needed in the country, other alternatives need to be found. One such viable alternative would be for the government to solicit assistance from some of the multinational corporations with local branches to join this most progressive of ventures.

This could come in the form of the adoption of certain sections of the nation’s highways and byways, and the regular material and/or capital-resource contributions for the upkeep of these arteries or roadways. Of course, private well-heeled individual citizens could patriotically join in the effort. The demonstration of goodwill in this sector of our national development will be more effective, if the government also proves itself to be fiscally disciplined, responsible and reasonably accountable in its appropriation of public revenue. This can be demonstrated in two ways. One, the lifestyles of highly placed public officials must be seen to synch with the general level of the country’s development.

Foreign donors and local philanthropists are unlikely to be encouraged to give off their maximum best, if those invested with the mandate of facilitating the salutary development of the nation are seen to be reckless and profligate in their appropriation of taxpayer cedis and pesewas. When I first read the story about the ministerial inauguration of the KNUST Footbridge, my attention was immediately piqued because as a former resident of Ghana’s historic Garden City and an alumnus of Prempeh College, I frequented the area of the footbridge quite a bit some 30 years ago. Those were the days of the Discotheque Generation. The days of the Golden Keys, Mamamuchis and New Orleanses. There was a decently modest nightclub in the vicinity.

The area was not nearly as dangerous as it is today, obviously because there were not nearly as many vehicles on our highways and byways the way it is presently. The country’s population since July 1985, when I happily departed Ghana for the United States (I couldn’t abide the Rawlings-Tsikata reign-of-terror any longer), has more than doubled, I suppose. But the location of the KNUST Footbridge, not very far from the University Bookstore and the KNUST Secondary School, or Tec-Sec, was still visibly dangerous. But, of course, the point of such danger was not my primary motivation for writing this column, but particularly what can be affordably done to remarkably ease up the high incidence of such danger. And on this score, of course, I am thinking about the construction of speed bumps to reasonably slow down the flow of traffic in order to enhance the safety of pedestrians, without inordinately congesting our roadways and unnecessarily lengthening travel time.

It would also be a good idea to station traffic police personnel during periods of heavy traffic flow in these “Bermuda Triangles” of our roadways, in order to promptly bring reckless motorists, as well as careless pedestrians to book. Done without prejudice, such an operation, or exercise, would help raise revenue for the Department of Motor Vehicles to help raise public awareness about the need for road safety through the use of billboards, both manual and electronic, as well as radio and television commercials.