Assault on Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu should be a wake up call

Truth be told, the regrettable, sad and unfortunate scenes of a mob assault on the Majority Leader, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, at the Suame Constituency in the Ashanti Region last Monday, is not an entirely unexpected incident.

It is also not a fair yardstick for determining the efficiency and popularity or otherwise of Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, the Member of Parliament for the area.

Rather, it is a manifestation of a disillusioned and frustrated electorate ready to vent spleen on any scapegoat seen to be in political leadership.

It is more of an attack on the Government and system than on Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu as an individual.

Other Members of Parliament, especially those on the tickets of the incumbent New Patriotic Party (NPP) could very easily fall victim to such a situation for that reason, what happened to Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu ought to be a wake-up call to reality.

What is disturbing is that it happened in the heart of the NPP’s political stronghold Region – Ashanti

If the electorate in the Ashanti Region is vexed to an extent they could physically pounce on their MP and the Majority Leader for that matter, then it is scary what the electorate in other parts of the country may do to drum home their piled anger or register their dissatisfaction with the state of affairs.

The angry mob insisted they had to physically manhandle the lawmaker because they were fed up with the poor state of roads in the Constituency and a rather slow state of developmental projects.

The angry artisans hooted at Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, pelted him with sachets of water and chased him until the police rescued and whisked him away to safety.

Complaints of the poor state of roads in several places across the country seem to be falling on deaf ears.

The defensive response has been that roads are being constructed in several other places therefore the complainants should endure and wait for their turn.

What is even more worrying is the heart-breaking trend where road contractors who started work have abandoned work at project sites for years and left the road in a worse state. It is now public knowledge that in almost all instances where road contractors have abandoned projects mid way, the major reason has been lack of funds.

Government has been unable to pay road contractors for too long. The back log is scary. Most of the said contractors went for bank loans with high interests. Some of those banks have run out of patience and gone for the collaterals.

Many of such road contractors have either sold their properties to service the loans or gone for other loans to service the first ones, a situation that piles up the interest.

Their only crime was that they were given a Government contract to construct roads.

Until Government puts a stop to the Public Relations gimmicks in the matter of unpaid road contractors, and finds some honest and creative approach to get them their unpaid monies, no Parliamentarian is safe.

The New Publisher reminds Government that when road contractors get paid, the money trickles down to a lot of other sectors.

Road contractors when paid, spreads the money cross artisans of several disciplines, construction material merchants, transport companies and other groups of workers.

It is sad that the MPs who are not in charge of paying road contractors to complete their projects are rather at the receiving end of the rising public anger.