Who sold or bought the official Bungalow of the Ministry of Interior? – Staffs of EPA strike

Workers of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will effective Friday May 3, 2024 close their doors to the public over issues surrounding the official bungalow for their Executive Director.

Subsequently, all EPA offices in all the sixteen Regions, including the Headquarters will be closed down while staff wear red bands to demand the Minister for Works and Housing to leave the bungalow as he came to meet it for the past 50 years since the EPA took over.

The divisional Chairman of Public Service Workers Union of Trade Union Congress, Environmental Protection Agency, Godsway Lawson Daniels, at a news conference on May 2, 2024 at about 8:00am started a demonstration from and around the Ministry of Environment Technology and Innovation (MESTI).

The Union at the press conference raised a number of questions including the whereabouts of the official bungalow, whether it is true that it has been sold, and if so,to  who? and why?

They also questioned why the former Minister for the Interior Ambrose Derry is not occupying the official bungalow of the Ministry of the Interior?

Background

It all started when the Minister responsible for Works and Housing, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah wrote to the EPA over the reallocation of the official bungalow of the Executive Director of EPA to the new Minister for the Interior, Henry Quartey.

Meanwhile, the bungalow has been occupied by successful Executive Directors including Dr. Henry Kokofu who is the immediate past Boss.  Since 1974 when the said land was allocated to the EPA by the then Housing Department and the EPA.

The residence was however purchased from the Housing Department by the EPA in the90s. The current Execuitive Director, Dr. Kingsley Krugu, is allegedly being forced out by the Minister for Works and Housing Kojo Oppong Nkrumah in an attempt to reallocate the said property to Minister Henry Quartey.

Many are asking where the current Executive Director of the EPA should move to? Some of the workers are of the view that the EPA has invested a lot into the edifice and that the government is intentionally taking the bungalow because of its interest in the land and the location. EPA workers are agitating and as a sign of anger and disapproval of the action of Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, they are wearing red bands all over the Headquarters of the Agency.

Today, they have declared an indefinite nationwide strike over the ongoing issue.

By Edzorna Francis Mensah