Ashanti Regional Library in distress

The Ashanti Regional Library in Kumasi, has been without power supply for over nine months, forcing children to learn under intense heat and therefore result to fanning themselves while reading.

The Electricity Company of Ghana disconnected the library because the library had not paid its bills for the past three months. The library has also not received any funding from the state over the same period. 

Most of the furniture, especially tables and chairs are not in good condition as some of them break while the children try using them while studying in the library.

One of the library users, an eight-year-old Rebecca Antwi, told the Junior Graphic that she lived in a compound house in Bantama, 200 metres away from the library and because of the noisy environment at her neighbourhood, she found the library the best place to study.

According to her, some of her friends preferred to play rather than visit the library because of the heat, especially during the day.

The Ashanti Regional Librarian, Ms Elizabeth Arthur, in an interview with the Junior Graphic said members of the Ashanti Professionals, a network of professionals pursuing development in the Ashanti Region had completed a GH¢40,000 renovation works on the library.

She said the group painted the children’s library, reference library, as well as the reading area, renovated the leaking roof and replaced all the broken louvres.

According to Mrs Arthur, the library has a mobile van and a pick-up vehicle it uses to visit children in the hinterlands in the region to offer them library services and ICT training.

She explained that some of the schools in the remote villages did not have computer laboratories, a situation which did not provide the children the opportunity to study computer science.

Ms Arthur appealed to the government, philanthropists and corporate institutions to come to the aid of the library to enable it offer quality services to the reading public.