Eight traders who are members of the Kumasi City Market Traders Union have sued to stop the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly from commencing the Kumasi Central Market Redevelopment Project.
They are trying to stop the demolition of more than one thousand stores for the project.
The traders maintain they have “legitimately occupied their present business premises for well over seven decades with some having inherited stores from deceased relatives.
They attached evidence of receipts of rent and toll payments in the affidavit.
The traders explained that because of the project, they were registered and relocated to be provided with stores within the new market on completion of the newly built Kumasi City Market “and therefore collected rent.
But the traders are now accusing the assembly of acting in bad faith.
Aside from not securing the new places of business, the traders said the market spaces “have been entirely cordoned off for demolition to commence the phase two of the project in disregard of their right to work to earn a decent living.
In the suit, the traders maintain that the Assembly has failed in its “constitutional obligation to be fair and reasonable in the discharge of their duties as they have neglected their genuine concern anchored in law and accepted conventions”.
The traders in their writ say they fear that if the Assembly is not stopped, their “constitutionally secured rights to work and undertake economic activities would be badly violated.”
