AFAG To Hold 'Ahokyere' Demo As Gun-Toting Police Swarm Press Confab

A spokes person of pressure group Alliance for Accountable Governance (AFAG) Martin Agyei-Akosah says the group will hit the streets next week on a peaceful demonstration against the recent upward adjustment in petroleum prices. The demonstration, dubbed the Ahokyere (suffering) demonstration, will take place on the 26th of January 2011. The National Petroleum Authority on Tuesday January 4, 2011, reviewed upwards by between 25 and 30 percent the prices of petroleum products in the country, citing increases in crude prices on the international market. But AFAG, in a statement released a day after, gave government a 10 day ultimatum to reduce the prices “or incur the wrath of AFAG and Ghanaians.” Mr Agyei-Akosah, who was speaking at a press conference at the 37 lorry station, stated that the 10 day ultimatum AFAG gave to government to reduce the fuel prices has elapsed, hence the demonstration. “We expected the government to have listened to the plight of the over-burdened Ghanaian and reduced these taxes. We are saddened the failure of President Mills’s government to honour its social contract made with Ghanaians. "The deception of the government is clear. We are in an era of broken promises. It is difficult to put body and soul together. We were promised reduction of taxes but rather we have increases. We were promised more jobs and today industries are collapsing. We were promised better living conditions but it has rather become bitter living era. "We cannot accept this situation, it’s a departure from what the NDC promised the good people of Ghana.” “AFAG and its allies stand shoulder to shoulder with the many families, mothers and breadwinners who can no longer withstand these harrowing economic policies of the Mills-Mahama administration.”