Barely 24-hours after the commissioning of the dual carriage Flower Pot interchange in Accra, a coconut hawker was sighted with her truck store with wares displayed on it under a section of the bridge.
A photo of Sahadatu Seidu, the hawker, quickly went viral with social media users and even media houses sharing the photo whiles highlighting the lack of enforcement of bye-laws on one hand and the indiscipline of some citizens on the other hand.
“I have only returned to my old selling point,” she said in an interview with Accra-based Channel One TV.
Commissioned by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the Flower Pot interchange cost a reported GH¢677 million to build. The project was executed by China Railway No. 5 Engineering Ghana Limited.
In his speech at the commissioning, on Tuesday, November 19, 2024, Daniel Nii Kwartei Titus-Glover, the Greater Accra Regional Minister, admonished the public against squatting, and placing kiosks and containers near the interchange.
The minister was later sighted destroying the table of a banana hawker who had also joined Sahadatu to sell their wares at the place.
Social media reactions
Osagyefo Oliver Barker-Vormawor wrote, “More money was stolen from that interchange than she will ever be able to sell in hawking coconut. What made you guys so blind to social inequality? She could be your mother! Perspective guys! Perspective!”
Adwoa Animah wrote, “It’s your civic responsibility to slap anyone you see selling or hawking under or around the newly built flower pot interchange. Also, anyone you see putting a poster on the walls. We can’t develop as a nation with level of irresponsibility.”
Tsigliwigliadzi Kormetorkpor Ometahidior wrote, “Hawkers are part of our ecosystem. We don’t need to rant and get angry about their existence. We just need to design the system to incorporate them. It’s part of the job creation, service provision, trade and the circularity of our everyday lives. Chill guys. Let the kube [coconut] seller be. Let us design and incorporate her into the system.”
Joyce Boudabes replied, “She can’t be my mother bcos my mother is a law abiding citizen. Why is it necessary to find excuses to promote indiscipline and lawlessness? What is wrong is wrong, regardless who does it.”
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