Kumba gov’t delegate’s sledgehammer looms over improper buildings

The Government Delegate to the Kumba City Council, Victor Nkelle Ngoh has issued a three-month period for unbefitting structures along the streets of Kumba to be demolished and modern ones constructed.

The Delegate is back in the streets issuing the order, two years after he gave as deadline, December 2014, for the demolition and reconstruction of modern buildings found along the main streets of the metropolis.

According to Ngoh’s orders, owners of inappropriate houses, especially those along the Kumba Commercial Avenue, should demolish them or the City Council’s bulldozers will do it for them.

The Government Delegate has been on the field since Tuesday, February 24, in the company of City Council staff and officials of the Divisional Delegation Urban Development and Town Planning (MINDHU), marking all houses that are incongruous with a modern city.

According to one of the City Council staff who spoke to The Post, the mission is the last after which no city dweller is expected to complain. He said the Government Delegate gave the owners of such houses over two years to either refurbish or rebuild them, but, till date, very few have reacted.

The Government Delegate’s team has marked houses at the Commercial Avenue, indicating the time within which they must either be refurbished or demolished.

2012 Demolition When the Government Delegate came out throughout the first quarter of 2012 demolishing houses that did not meet public taste, there was general outcry from local CPDM party leaders. At a YCPDM joint conference held back in the wake of the demolition in 2012, YCPDM Section President for Meme IA, John Kingue, had observed that; “the City Council’s demolition exercise jeopardises the party’s chances at the forthcoming elections (2013) elections. It has caused wanton destruction all in the name of getting off nuisance. Thousands of families and peasant farmers have been rendered homeless, causing misery, poverty and suffering with the consequence being theft.”

The Section President had stated that, the Government Delegate did not know what it takes to get someone elected into office; given that he (Government Delegate) was merely appointed, that is why he was embarking on such an exercise. Kingue’s reaction came after that of Prince Ekale Mukete, CPDM Meme IA Section President, who had described the demolition exercise as ‘nonsense’. Isaac Mukwelle, Kumba III CPDM Section President had, in a communiqué still in 2012, praised the Government Delegate for his courage.

In the phase of the mixed reactions, Ngoh’s predecessor, Caven Nnoko Mbele, told militants that leadership is not as easy as people see or think. Nnoko cautioned that them to be careful the way the criticise others, recalling that when he was in office, he took actions and decisions for which some people encouraged him while others chastised him.