The Deputy Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, Mr Benito Owusu-Bio has directed a private developer, Dr Adu-Ampomah to, as a matter of urgency, halt all building activities on a parcel of land leased to the Bulgarian Embassy.

The Deputy Minister gave the directive when he stormed the construction site in Accra on Wednesday, 16 March 2022 to witness the flouting of regulations and rules of law by the building contractor and his clients.

Speaking to the caretaker of the site, Mr Owusu-Bio insisted that ongoing works be put on hold while the dispute over the ownership of the land is settled in court.

He disclosed that the Bulgarian Embassy has a sublease of 10 years which has not yet expired. "We are aware of a litigation between the Embassy and the Developer. So, if anything at all, in the interim, nobody must be here working".

He bemoaned, "Yesterday, when we heard of this, we asked the Lands Commission to put a ‘stop work’ notice on the premises but our attention has been drawn to the fact that those notices have been removed".

Mr Owusu-Bio stressed that the Lands Commission is constitutionally mandated to stop the private developer from working and admonished that the owner of the structure stop work while investigations continue.

For his part, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Kweku Ampratwum-Sarpong, said the private developer has no backing of the government to continue building and must stop work with immediate effect.

The two deputy ministers were accompanied on this exercise by the Technical Director of Lands at the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources, Mr Maxwell Nsafoa.