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Traders and passers-by within the Central Business District of Accra- between the Rawlings Park and UTC- are yet to witness another disaster, which planning engineers say could be fatal if not prevented.

Many structures including houses and shops will suffer the brunt of an ongoing construction of an underground structure in the vicinity.

A businessman, George Yaw Mireku a.k.a king George Enterprise, who claimed to have purchased a property in the area decided to demolish an old building on the land located opposite the Rawlings Park in Accra to reconstruct it.

In the process however, George Yaw Mireku is aggressively digging the ground to enable him put up a basement, a situation which has affected all nearby buildings around the plot.

Information gathered during our investigation was that George Yaw Mireku, even though claims to have secured permit from the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) to put up his building, the permit which was approved from the A.M.A. did not authorize him to construct a basement.

Residents, shop owners and affected individuals, sensing danger at the degree of damage the digging of the basement caused to their buildings and how fatal it could be in the event of collapse, reported to the A.M.A which invited George Yaw Mireku over the matter.

According to information, the A.M.A ordered George Yaw Mireku to repair the damage caused to all the affected buildings with designs and specifications but he failed to do so, saying that the cost involve in the repair to the damage he  had created after digging the ground was too expensive and tried to improvise his own methods to reduce cost .

In another development, the police have also invited George Yaw Mireku and demanded that he produced his documents for their perusal to enable the police settle the impasse between him and other residents, but George Yaw Mireku refused the police order and protested that they rather sue him in court and said he had no site plan to produce but rather pictures of the structure he demolished to reclaims the land.

Meanwhile, owners of the affected buildings who pleaded with the A.M.A after series of confrontations with George Mireku, the businessman for failing to undertake the repair works on their damaged buildings, were arrested by the Regional police command rather for encroachment in their efforts to undertake the repair works themselves on their legitimate property.

Also further checks at the Lands Commission indicated that the indenture he submitted to the A.M.A for which permit was given seemed questionable since the area demarcation did not correspond with dimensions on the document he has and claims to contain.

 The owners of the said land on which George Yaw Mireku is constructing revealed that they have not sold any of their properties to him and that there is no way they were going to allow him continue with his project, which they are currently challenging in court.

A visit to the site revealed approximately a 15 feet-deep down dug pit which was created with an excavator by the contractor for George Mireku to construct an underground basement for car park, contrary to the A.M.A permit and dimensions on both repair works and the construction of his facility.

Further checks on planning and structural drawings from the A.M.A Works Department approving his permit for construction revealed his new building does not contain a basement and also an offset space between his new building and that of the existing structures of ten feet is also being ignored by George Yaw Mireku.

Residents are complaining that George Yaw Mireku had caused the connection of water to the site "illegally" since the connection was done without any water meter.

According to them, before the connection onto George Yaw Mireku's site, they were having free flow of water but the flow of water has seized due to the illegal connection which was done by George Yaw Mireku's contractor on site.

Also septic tank which was buried underground serving residents was destroyed by the excavator during the digging of the pit.

Several confrontations have erupted due to Mr. Yaw Mireku's defiling of the orders on the specified permit granted to him by the A.M.A.

Traders lamenting on the issue noted that the disaster yet to come, even though has been witnessed by the A.M.A Engineers during an inspection by the Mayor of Accra, Dr. Alfred Okoe Vanderpuije seemed to have been ignored, resulting in cracks in surrounding buildings (GTP House) which are gradually expanding by inches on a daily base .

She recalled the incidents of Melcom disaster which occurred in November 2012, and the Nii Boi Town Hotel collapse which occurred on March 13, 2014 and the Cantonment building collapse on 26th July, 2015, which happened under the eye of the Mayor of Accra, were all caused by negligence and selfish interest of some building inspectors and engineers of the A.M.A Works department, which the Mayor should have double checked during his Planning Committee meeting with his engineers and planners.

Speaking to some current occupants of the property, who are the grand children of the titled owner of the said land, they complained about the conduct of the Accra Regional Police Command who has persistently threatened them on their own land rather to assist George Yaw Mireku to take over their land illegitimately.

Mercy Nyorkor Ntre, one of the grandchildren of the land owner said the construction of the underground structure within the place could cause havoc and that George Yaw Mireku must be stopped.

Efforts by the news team to speak to the Director for Works at the Accra Metropolitan Assembly on a scheduled appointment on Saturday, December 26, 2015 morning, at the site at 9 am with the land owners proved futile as the Engineer, Mr. Victor Mensah failed to turn up after he rescheduled the appointment to 10:30 am.

However, George Mireku declined to talk to our scouts who chanced on his contractor, S. K. Asante at the site and informed him that some group of journalists were there for an inspection with the land owners.

S. K. Asante also informed George Mireku that he sense danger of his workers being arrested by the police if they should continue with work at the site, since they have not fulfilled their obligation of constructing the defensive wall to avert the collapse of other buildings at the site and would advise that they rather complete the defense walls to sustain the two walls to fortify their foundation from being collapse.