Ellen opens Omega Market

President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has dedicated the Omega Village and Complex, a market in Omega Community – Paynesville suburb of Monrovia. The President said the facility seems more appropriate to give more comfort to market women “to whom we owe so much.”

“And Redlight being what it was, with all the ugliness, with all the congestion, the contention that existed there, we really wanted to see our marketers move over to a place,” she said at the dedicatory ceremony recently.

Mrs. Sirleaf said the work is impressive, but it is not yet finished because “we” need to move the full length, adding that “if we are going to move the marketers from Redlight, we have to have a clear roadmap, a clear plan, timed action to be able to do that.”

The Omega Village and Complex project which also encompasses housing, was undertaken by a philanthropic group, Alpha Kappa Alpha in an effort to reach out to market women who President Sirleaf says played instrumental role in her election.

The President lauded the dedication, commitment and passion of the organization in ensuring the market facilities were done at the Omega Site to move those women from the highly congested Redlight environment.

She mandated that trucks transporting locally produced products from the counties to Monrovia should move from Redlight to the Omega Facilities so that the transport unions and the marketers follow the produce, saying “Where the produce go, that’s where they go.”

Mrs. Sirleaf also encouraged store owners to consider building stores at the Omega Village so that buyers can still buy dry goods and other products that they normally buy at the supermarkets, while buying fresh produce at the Omega Village.

Later on Saturday, 23 July President Sirleaf dedicated a Government of Liberia- World Bank partnership power project in the Seventy Second Community of Paynesville, connecting over a thousand residents. She recalled that in early 2006, her Administration reflected upon the fact that Monrovia had been without power for close to two decades; and only those who could afford generators had lights because “there was no light coming from the central point.”

She said the promise to restore electricity did not mean that light would be in every village or community; but the promise was kept as part of a partnership arrangement between countries of ECOWAS. “… So today we have many generators coming on now. Today with our support of the United States and others our hydro will … be fixed. By December this year our hydro will be fixed,” she said.

President Sirleaf said it took her government some time because these things don’t come cheaply, but take plenty money, while the lack of technical people, tools and other difficulties contributed to the slow pace of delivery.

Montserrado County District #5 Representative Thomas Fallah said it was big July 2016 Independence Day gift to the people of Paynesville, as he told the President that there was no holiday gift more than the light she has provided to the residents.

He also commended the President for connecting 72nd Community to the SKD Boulevard Road, noting that it will ease traffic congestion.

By Winston W. Parley-Editing by Jonathan Browne