A team from the Tema Development Corporation (TDC) acting with a high level of heartlessness has demolished a shop and a boutique loaded with several goods and even cash at Tema Community 18, just opposite Devtraco Estate.
The demolition on Friday afternoon, July 19, 2024, was carried out despite several residents pleading with the team from TDC to allow the mother and daughter who owned both the boutique and Shop to at least pack out their goods and other belongings from the store and boutique before their demolitions.
The mother, Julie and her daughter, Deborah, have been trading in the area for over 10 years, starting their business from a humble beginning. They initially started business with a provision store and expanded to clothing when Deborah opened a boutique near the provision shop. Through hard work and dedication, they managed to grow their business. But what they took over 10 years to build was destroyed in a very inhumane and heartless manner by the Tema Development Corporation staff in less than 30 minutes. The team from TDC visit the area with a bulldozer and a pickup. Some staff stayed in the pick up as they watched their colleague with the excavator destroyed the shop and boutique. It was a sorrowful sight to behold as the goods were bulldozed while Deborah cried bitterly.
Deborah wept uncontrollably as she watched the destruction of their business. Not even the tears of the young lady could stop the TDC team to allow Deborah and her mother to at least take their goods and belongings from the store and boutique before their joint destruction.
The only crime of the mother and daughter is that a landlady who recently completed her house at the back of the stores want a clear view and so ordered TDC staff to demolish the store and boutique.
Some residents alleged that the Tema Development Corporation team was hugely paid by the landlady to ensure that the boutique and store were destroyed in a matter of minutes without even empathy to allow the mother and daughter to remove their goods.
Some angry residents after the demolition could be heard cursing the TDC team for their “cruel and inhumane” action that has taken the mother and daughter financial life backward in a twinkle of an eye.
The residents believe that TDC could have at least allowed the mother and daughter to remove their goods from the store and boutique before demolishing them but should not have thrown them into hardship overnight with the sort of heartless demolition where all their goods were destroyed in under 30 minutes, their business built over a period of more than one decade destroyed in one day just because one landlady needs a clear view of her house.