The government does not currently have any plans in place to resettle the people who were displaced by the controlled spillage of excess water from the Akosombo and Kpong Dams, according to Minister of Energy Dr. Matthew Opoku Prempeh.
The Energy Minister claims that there are no immediate plans for relocation because the government has already established an interministerial committee that is still in operation and under stress until its task is finished.
On Wednesday, November 8, 2023, the Energy Minister spoke to Parliament regarding the Volta River Authority’s spill and the ensuing destruction.
Significant flooding caused by the spillage left residents homeless and submerged large areas of land in communities along the lower Volta basin.
In response to some relevant questions from the press following the spill, Dr. Mathew Opoku Prempeh stated that most people impacted by the spill had previously been found as a result of similar incidents, but he also emphasized that they always come back when the water recedes.
“This is not the first time excess water in the Akosombo Dam is being spilled. I think that we have a difficult time on our hands.”
“Where the flooding has been occurring every year upstream in the north, there are resettlement packages that are sent to them every year but as soon as the water recedes, these people go back to the sites.”
“However, it is not because of anything; it is because of economic livelihoods. They are either fishermen who want to settle around the coast; or farmers who want to settle around the best land which is found where the water is. And so, it is a difficult thing which we have to deal with,” the Energy Minister stated.
The Minister told the House that the Volta River Authority (VRA) had already sufficiently sensitized many of the impacted communities prior to the spill.
He refuted allegations that the VRA had handled the circumstances improperly, leading to the catastrophe, and he defended the Authority’s prompt intervention.
The Energy Minister claimed that if they hadn’t made a decision at that moment, the dam’s integrity would have been jeopardized, and the outcome might have been worse.
“If the VRA had not been proactive in spilling the water coming into the reservoir this year, it would have overtopped the Akosombo Dam, which would have had an unimaginable catastrophic impact on the people,” he added.
