Achimota Forest: We've suffered historical injustice — Owoo family speaks

According to the family, it has suffered grave historical injustice over the non-payment of compensation to it for the State's acquisition in 1927.

Some portions of the Achimota Forest in Accra, in the southern periphery handed over to the Owoo family in 2013, is no longer a forest reserve.

It follows the coming into force of the Executive Instrument (E.I.) 144 gazetted on behalf of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo on April 19, 2022.

This means effective May 1, 2022, those portions, [361 acres] sections of which had been developed and had already been granted to the Owoo family in September 2013 are no longer a forest reserve.

But the family in a statement to set the records straight said "the much talked about 19th August 2016 ceremony which has been erroneously stated in the public as an occasion when the land was released to the Owoo family is false and misleading. That ceremony was a sod-cutting ceremony for the development of the Achimota Forest into an Eco-Tourism Park. The Owoo families were mere invitees/guests."

It said "The acreage due the Owoo family was arrived at through a long-standing negotiations which in many respects predates the current administration. This was done with the active involvement of various State technical negotiators and agencies.

"The Owoo family has petitioned all governments in the fourth republican dispensation and indeed is yet to take possession of any parcel of land to date."