Lolonya community expressed worry over the work of Electrochem Ltd..

Residents of Lolonya, a salt mining community in the Ada-West District, have expressed worry over the work of Electrochem Ghana Ltd., a private company that has been granted mining lease by the government of Ghana to mine salt in the Ada Songor lagoon. 

Lolonya community is one of the prime salt mining areas in Ada as far as the Ada salt lagoon is concerned. Salt production in the songor lagoon relies on the Lolonya community due to the fact that the community is the closest coastal community and serves as the sea water intake point of the lagoon for the then vacuum salt company.

The new company, Electrochem Ghana Ltd, has also identified the same community as their sea water intake points for their ongoing constructed pans. 

In a community durbar organised at the instance of community members, the community members vehemently expressed their dissatisfaction over the work and the potential threat the creating of new trench will bring to their community. 

They told Radio Ada reporters that neither did the company nor the chiefs of Ada consulted them for their views on the impact of the project.

 Some were also of the view that the chiefs are conniving with the private company to take away their means of livelihood passed on to them by their ancestors. In a visit to the project site at the Lolonya Water intake point, Radio Ada saw what the community described as a deliberate attempt by the company to make their community unsafe for them. The ground was dug in a trench form with mud heaped and spread on its sides by heavy bulldozers.The heaped mud on one side of the trench looks like a mud road being constructed. The trench is then connected to the sea for the sea water to flow and travel it way into the lagoon.

 From a lay man's view, one can see clearly that the trench has deny community members access to the easter plain land of the community which the women said use to be play ground for children as well as their fish drying grounds. 

The community members in expressing their indigenous knowledge and lifelong learning experiences said the sea may end up submerging their community when allowed to flow through the trench in that manner.

 They are of the view that the community which is already below sea level risks submerging when the tides are high. Some few community members interpretate that to mean a clever way of relocating them. Meanwhile, engineers of the company on site at the time of the visit were not willing to speak to the media. The second complaint the news team received from the local women who double as fishmongers is that they have lost their plain ground for drying anchovies to the construction. In a visit to the community chief for response, the chief and his secretary responded that they see nothing wrong with the construction going on since they have had a meeting with management of Electrochem who has promised them goodies.

 They also told the news team the company has expressed no intention in displacing or relocateing the community as being speculated by community members. 

The secretary to the chief will not want the news team to listen to community members or report anything from the community. Some of the youth are accusing traditional leadership within and outside their community of allowing themselves to be compromised. Meanwhile, unconfirmed report received after the team's visit has it that some youth have started silting the trench.

Source; Radio Ada.