Reconstruction of a temporary bridge has begun at the collapsed bridge site on the major road that links East Mamprusi Municipal and the West Mamprusi Municipal in the North East Region.
The work on the temporal bridge is being executed by the Macopa Construction Limited, a Ghanaian construction firm which is expected to use one week to finish it.
This came to light last Friday when the Member of Parliament for Walewale Constituency and Minister of Children, Gender and Social Protection, Hajia Lariba Zuweira Abudu and the North East Regional Director of Ghana Highway Authority, Mr Andrews Yaw Okyere visited the area.
A river situated in Tinguri, a farming community in the West Mamprusi Municipal of the North East Region got flooded following a heavy rain on Wednesday and spilled over the banks to cause the collapse of the bridge.
The heavy rain that hit the region lasted for 12 hours and caused a lot of havoc in every part of the region, destroyed farm lands, washed away some major roads, properties worth thousands of Ghana cedis and buildings.
Not only the West Mamprusi and the East Mamprusi municipalities were cut off, other districts in the region were also cut off from the rest of the districts in the region.
Yunyoo-Nasua and Chereponi districts linking Nalerigu, the North East Regional capital were totally cut off from the rest of the district.
Mr Okyere said the intensity of the rainfall was so much that the Tinguri dam spilled over and washed away the bridge.
He said they were currently putting up a temporal measure to establish the link to restore the road for easy passage at the moment.
The director stated that a bailey bridge would be erected across the river a bit far from the existing damaged road to provide temporal relief.
He said the construction of the bridge would provide a temporal solution, whilst the Ministry of Roads and Highway was preparing to construct a much bigger culvert bridge in the area across the road to replace the damaged one.
Mr Okyere added that many of the damaged roads washed away by the rains across the region would also be worked on.
He, however, appealed to road users in the region to exercise patience as they were working closely with the contractor to finish it on time.
For her part, Hajia Abudu said her visit to the place was to assess the extent of damage cause to the affected people and how to get aid to the disaster victims.
She said many people had been stranded, especially travellers due to the collapse of the Tinguri-Gbani bridge and called on the contractors to speed up work on the bridge
“We have never seen a spillage of the Tinguri River since our childhood days, this is the first time we are witnessing this in the West Mamprusi Municipality of the North East Region,” she stated.
Hajia Abudu urged members of the Tinguri-Gbani community to cooperate with the contractors as they were there to support them put the bridge back to shape.
FROM YAHAYA NUHU NADAA, WALEWALE
