SUAME MAGAZINE

Light-industrial Living
Acknowledgements
This study could not have been
carried out without the help and
guidance from our supervisor
Jørgen Eskemose. We would also
like to thank Kumi Koduah Secre-
tary of GNAG, Charles Ampomah,
Metropolitan Engineer, KMA, and
Krossman Hormenoo, Vice Su-
pervisor of ITTU for helping us
achieving a general understanding
of The Magazine. Also we would
like to thank the people taking their
time to tell us their life stories; Es-
pecially, Yaw Peprah, Baah-Awuah
Atuaene, Thomas Owusu Ansah,
Tenii Akapenkum, Kofi Akapen-
kum, Josef Asante, and Samson
Frimpong. Finally, thanks to the
people of The Magazine for their
hospitality and understanding.

2
Preface
The four of us, Rosalina Wen-
ningsted-Torgard, Peter Schulz
Schovsbo, Bjarke Ballisager, and
Jesper Wegener Bonde, are all
4th year students of Architecture,
taking our Master’s Degrees at
The Royal Danish Academy of
Fine Arts, School of Architecture, in
Copenhagen.
settlements) at The Royal Danish
Academy of Fine Arts, School of
Architecture in conjunction with
KNUST (Kwame Nkrumah Univer-
ity of Science and Technology) in
Kumasi.

From 1st of March to 11th of May,

we have been residing in com-
pound houses with local families
in Old Tafo, Kumasi, Ghana. While
living here, experiencing the ev-
eryday Ghanaian life and culture,
we have conducted a study of The
Suame Magazine, an area planned
for light-industrial activities focus-
ing on vehicle repairing.

As part of a group of 19 students,

studying different subjects within
the Kumasi area, we have been
introduced to different aspects of
Ghanaian city-planning. The study
has been organised by Jørgen
“They can do everything in The Magazine
Andreasen and Jørgen Eskemose - apart from human beings.”
from DHS (Department of Human Mr. Poku, Town and Country Planning Department

3
Abstract
The Suame Magazine in Kumasi,
Ghana is one of Africa’s largest
light-industrial clusters. It is an
area of 200 ha filled with polluted
industrial waste and noisy, auto-
mechanical workshops.
But a quick glance reveals that it is
more than an industrial site.
A walk through the area reveals
that people are actually living here.
Clothes are hanging out to dry,
children are playing, women are
cooking, and people are eager to
present their homes. Do people
live here out of need, or is The
Magazine in such a state that
people choose to live here?

The Magazine as an industrial site

is perhaps a phenomena of the
past. The combination of industrial
and residential zones, are seldom
planned. In the case of The Maga-
zine this also seems to be the
fact, although old plans from Town
and Country Planning Depart-
ment in Kumasi show that part of
The Magazine is parcelled out for
mixed use.

…at night the flames from the

garbage-fires within The Magazine
creates a slight understanding of
the size of the area. The blue glints
lighting in the distance from the
many welding workshops and the
black columns of smoke coming
from piles of burning tyres make
the area resembles a scenery from
the science fiction film Blade Run-
ner.

How and why do people live

under these conditions?

4
Content
The Concept of Living 6
Methodology 8
History of The Magazine 8
Physical Description 9
Functional Description 12
Magazine Experience 13
Organisation 14
Landownership 15
World Bank 16
The Concept of Clusters 16
Artisans and Apprentices 17
Building Typologies 18
Description of Each Zone 22
Selection Criteria 23

Area A
Offinso Road 24
Physical Appearance of the Buildings 27
Between Buildings 27
Residential Buildings 30
Going Into the Magazine 31

Area B
The Nkradam Stream 32
The Artisans’ Workshops 34
The Shopping Street 34
The compound 37
The Settlement 37
The Landlady 38

Interviews 39
Yaw Peprah 41
Thomas Owusu Ansah 44
Baah-Awuah Atuaene 46
Tenii Akapenkum 50
Residential Density 53
Discussion 55
Conclusion 56
Postscript 57
Notes 59
References 59
Programme 60
The Magazine 2025 63

5
The Concept of Living
Home, to house, to reside, or to
accommodate. These are all words
within the sphere of a general
concept of living. To uncover what
people understand as their home is
in this case, to investigate the daily
life that takes place at a specific
site. By observing who physically
use space at changing times and
with different purposes, and how
these individuals themselves
describe the functions of the exact
place, we gain knowledge on
which mental and physical bricks
are being used in the construction
of the idea of a home.
When reflecting on the concept
of home, it is necessary to
understand some general human
needs and mechanisms in a wider
perspective. The impact of cultural,
rational or, individually based
needs makes each specific case
unique, and slightly different from
the other.
Humans have a fundamental need
for sleep. Obvious to everyone it is
preferable if this need takes place
under secure and comfortable
conditions. But security and
comfort does not consist of
universal, eternal factors. They
differ according to fundamental
issues like climatic conditions,
culture, but also to individual
perspectives as demarcation of
private spheres, priorities in ones
personal life, and positions in local,
environmental hierarchies, and the
relationship to work, family or other
social networks. Because such
subjective factors play a major role
in the description of a home; what
may be fulfilling conditions to one
individual, at the same time may
be completely incomprehensible
and unacceptable to another. In
6
other words, what serves as a
basic space for sleeping, eating,
laundry washing, and spending of
leisure time to one, might appear
as public space, work space, or
something else to another.
Using space in different ways and
at different times is not foreign to
us. Leisure time and work hours
have been combined in a flow
of time for each single individual
to schedule. As part of this
development, the physical spaces
originally intended or understood
as home and workspace have also
changed. Technology has had a
great impact on our structures of
both physical and psychological
boundaries, and as well as the
changed distinction between work
and leisure time, the boundaries of
our private, public and work related
spaces, have gone from a solid to
fluid state.
The tendency, to create a hybrid
space occupied by several
categories of functions, is also
frequently found in societies where
the majority of the population
works as artisans, farmers and
within the informal sector mostly
in petty trade. This basically
separates the subject of combining
spaces into two main categories
consisting of the ones who have
the opportunity and means to
choose alternatives, and the ones
who acts out of need.
The hierarchy of conditions for
certain functions of a specific
area is, among other factors,
determining for our immediate
perception of the intended use
of space. Often this hierarchy
appears visually in the shape of
recognisable structures or notes
and makes us categorise the area
as, for instance, an industrial site,
a residential site, a commercial site
or a recreational site.
Indications of these categories can
be found within the infrastructure,
the scale of buildings, the materials
of which they are constructed and
the way they are situated along
the streets or in the landscape,
quantity and use of green areas
and trees, the possibilities for
shopping, the governmental or
privately provided institutions, and
the frequency and character of
human activity during the day and
the night.
The general weighing of the
specific functions of an area might
not be equal to one another, but
any activity, human or mechanical,
leaves traces of itself behind, and
by following these traces a new
understanding of the specific area
might be obtained.
This report has its focus on
different aspects of housing and
living in an area formally zoned
as light-industrial area as well as
areas zoned for mixed use. No
plots are planned by the KMA for
residential use only.
Our location is Kumasi, Ghana, a
city with a population which has
grown from 700,000 to 1,200,000
without having an answer to the
question:
“Where do these new
citizens find shelter?”
To answer this comprehensive
question is not specifically our field
of investigation; but our studies
are concerned with habitation in
The Magazine, and therefore might
answer part of the question.
Through its immediate
appearance, The Magazine has
generally been categorised as a
single purpose (its diversity lays
within the field of the individual
specialisation of the artisans),
light-industrial site, mainly dealing
with repairing of vehicles, spare-
part trading, and different kind
of metal work. It is known even
outside Ghana as a cluster of
well skilled artisans, whereto car
and truck owners from as far as
Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Togo, and
Ivory Coast come to have their
vehicles repaired.
According to Obeng 100,000
people are estimated to work
in The Magazine in the year
2005.1 If this number is correct
the Magazine has an enormous
impact on the economy of Kumasi,
and even the national economy of
Ghana.
The interesting thing when
searching for people residing in
The Magazine is that the area
represents a part of Kumasi,
dominated by light industry and
auto-mechanical services. Any
other function or facility adjusts
itself according to the conditions
of an industrial site. Any person
spending time here spends time
under the premises of mechanical
industry.
The Magazine offers functions and
facilities which are beneficial to the
artisans, the apprentices and their
common working environment. To
search for housing in this area, is
to dive into a pool of oil and iron,
get under the surface, and spot
the little inevitable signs left behind
from humans living their lives here;
twenty four hours a day, all year
round.
1
George Yaw Obeng p. 3
Do people actually live here, and if “Do people actually sleep
yes, why? Is there a recognisable
residential area hidden behind
in The Magazine?”
the wall of machinery, where
During a one-day reconnaissance
everyday life takes place more or
tour of the area, our opening
less unaffected by the surrounding
question was answered. People do
massive of engine blocks and bus
sleep in The Magazine. They live
bodies? How does life reveal itself
their lives here and they have done
in such scenery? Who lives here?
it for years. They are not trying to
What are the pros and cons of
hide this fact. Friendly, they show
residing in such surroundings?
us their homes.
We investigate with eyes
The originator of the statement
influenced by our own lives and
claiming that The Magazine
our own cultural background. The
lays desolated from evening till
distinct noises, the sharply pointed
sunrise, must either have made
litter from metal stretchers and the
his announcement out of wishful
chemicals from car paint-work,
thinking, far from the actual site,
whose toxic smells find its way to
or he has been wearing blinkers
your nostrils usually, in our minds,
during his survey of the area. The
belong to certain demarcated sites,
statement is out-dated, and we
plastered with signs saying
have replaced it with our primary
research questions:
“Unauthorised
trespassing prohibited”.
“How and why do
We would not add playing children,
people dining and drinking or
people live in The
chickens, goats, sheep’s or pigs Magazine?”
looking for titbits, to this picture. It
would twist it radically and make it
appear unreliable.
The Magazine is a foreign place
to us and it has redefined and
extended our point of view.
We have tried to understand in
which way the cultural language
communicates, how indications
differ from what we are used to
and how concepts and ideas
assume foreign, unknown shapes.
Our opinion has been, that places
might not only be exactly what
they appear to be, that they
often consist of, or contain, more
than what is immediately visible.
We have stuck to this opinion
throughout the working process,
but as an opening to our main
topic we asked the basic question
7
Methodology History of
The Magazine
Unaware of the content of our cho-
sen area we initiated our fieldwork
by making spontaneous expedi-
tions through The Magazine. In
order to shed a brighter light on
the 200 ha, we have also been
studying aerial photographs. The
different dates of the photographs
made it easier to comprehend the
development of The Magazine.
Using a GPS receiver we position-
fixed several UTM coordinates.
Without difficulties the coordinates
could be identified in the field as
well as on the two aerial photo-
graphs. This assisted us in draw-
ing maps of the area as well as
identifying specific locations found
while doing fieldwork.
Because of the limited time, we
chose to conduct a more thorough
study in two areas covering ap-
proximately ½ ha each. Based on
visual indications we chose two
areas containing the various build-
ing typologies that we had found
throughout The Magazine. In order
to cover an as large variety of in-
habitants as possible, we conduct-
ed a series of quantitative inter-
views with those living and working
within the two survey areas.
In addition to the quantitative
surveys, we completed a series
of qualitative interviews with KMA
civil servants. Besides the KMA we
made qualitative interviews with
residents, workers and various or-
ganizations in The Magazine. We
studied the limited litterature done
on the area, and finally we invited
the stakeholders of The Magazine
to a workshop concerning our find-
ings and conclusions.
8
The Magazine originated as
informal family businesses work-
ing with brass artefacts, goldsmith
and armoury manufacturing. In the
late 1920´s most of the prevalent
trades such as blacksmithing, gold-
smithing, and brass artefacts work
originated as businesses in homes
but vehicle repairing became a
prosperous business and artisans
came together in small groups.
The clustering of the artisans
continued and at the same time
the development of the city infra-
structure continued to relocate
the artisans to various sites in the
inner city. As the businesses have
grown bigger the apprentices no
longer only come from within the
families, but from all over Ghana
to learn the skills performed in The
Magazine.
In 1935, groups of artisans or-
ganised in clusters in the formerly
armoury area known as the “maga-
zine”. The name refers to the
magazine in a weapon, and has
stuck to the workshops ever since.
These fitter workshops were found
near the present site of the Kumasi
Zoo and Suame Police Station. In
the plan from 1963, the present
Extract of the 1971 Plan
5
Interviews with Samson Frimpong and Thomas Owusu Ansah
site of The Magazine has been laid
out as an industrial zone and since
The Magazine has been located in
Suame. The name “Magazine” has
become a term for this kind of clus-
ters used in the mid and northern
part of Ghana.2 The Suame Maga-
zine is the largest informal indus-
trial area in Ghana, and one of the
biggest clusters in micro and small
enterprises (MSEs) in Africa. 3
In 1971, the roads of The Maga-
zine were in very poor condition
and the buildings were built of
temporary materials. The Town
and Country Planning Department
drew a new plan for the area in
which new roads and plots were
parcelled out. Along Offinso Road
the plots are planned for mixed use
and behind these plots the area is
for light-industry. The plan is car-
ried out almost as it is drawn, but
without the commercial and scrap
metal areas planned within the
light-industrial plots.4 The plots for
mixed use are 900 square metres
and three times as big as the plots
for light-industrial use. Residen-
tial buldings occur on most of the
mixed used plots, which according
to the owners are 40 years old. 5
2
George Yaw Obeng p. 1-2
3
Catherine Nyaki Adeya p. 9
4
The Town and Country Planning Department
Physical Description
The Suame Magazine is located
on the sloping area east of the
main road towards the northern
Ghana. The Nkradam stream run-
ning all the way through the area
demarcates the different boundar-
ies of the local chiefs’ land pos-
sessions and divides the area into
a New and an Old Site. It is not
possible to cross the stream by car
but pedestrians can cross on small
bridges constructed of old car body
parts and wooden boards.
Studies of an aerial photograph
from 2002 show that The Maga-
zine cover 200 ha. It has reached
its limitations for outward expan-
sion and there is among many a
wish for acquiring new land for new
workshops. Compared to the aerial
photograph of 1994, the Breman
residential area north of the site
has consumed the portion of The
Magazine that had expanded on
the northern side of New Road. At
the same time new land has been
occupied by Magazine activities on
the plain in New Site.
The Magazine can be categorized
into three different areas. The
sloping area west of the stream
and east of Offinso Road is known
as the Old Site. The area was
planned in 1971 by the Town and
Country Planning Department. It
is an area of 50 ha consisting of
47 mixed use plots of 900 square
metres each, and 783 light-indus-
trial plots varying from 140 square
metres to 1200 square metres.
The plan of the Old Site is drawn in
respect of the topography. Offinso
Road runs along a ridge; from the
road towards the stream there is a
difference in altitude of 30 metres.
The plan is laid out as a grid, but
because of the landscape it curves covering 100 ha is unplanned and
within the grid-structure and you only has rudimentary infrastruc-
cannot see the end of the road or ture: In the years between 1994
the next crossroad. In conjunction and 2002 the workshops have
with the small sized plots of 140 stretched into the remaining open
square metres, the space becomes space of the New Site, not fol-
intimate. lowing an plan. A plan from 1997
exists, but has never been imple-
This Old Site has received rem- mented due to lack of funding.
edies from a World Bank project,
which started in 1996. Ghana Several workshops in this area
received loans for construction of are dealing with large trucks and
surfaced roads, roadside drains; busses, and this has had a sig-
street lightning, public toilets, and nificant impact on the shaping of
upgrading of existing public toilets
as well as construction of waste
disposal sites.
The two other Magazine areas are
in the New Site. One is a 20 ha
area parcelled out as a grid with
funding from another earlier World
Bank project. It consists of 208
plots of around 500 square metres
each. The plots are well demar-
cated and the roads are easily ac-
cessible. They are all of the same
size, which makes the structure
homogeneous.
In contrast to the Old Site, the
other part of the New Site, an area 1971 Plan
Present site of The Magazine
9
 1:4000

Su
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Ne
w
Ro
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oa
oR
ins
Off
1:50000 Cemetery

ad
Freeman Centre

Ro
ng
po
am
M
Cemetery

Waterworks

Suame Roundabout

The 1:25000

1997 Plan - not implemented
the structure. The roads are not
laid out orthogonal, neither are
they organised in a manner that
all workshops can be accessed
properly by car. Studies of aerial-
photographs show that the New
Site only has a few closed streets,
which makes it easy to manoeuvre
large vehicles in and out of the
area. There are almost no dead
ends and the crossroads have
developed according to the turning
circle of big trucks.
There is lack of draining in the
New Site. The flat swamped
ground near the streams gets
flooded during heavy rainfall. The

Old Site - upgraded in 1996 by World Bank World Bank - New Site - upgraded before 1994 New Site

10
 Su S
Suua
S uaam
m amme
ee N e Ne
New
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New Site

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Old Site Cemetery

Cemetery
Cemetery
Cemetery

W. B. Site

adad
aadd

Freeman
Freeman Centre

RRo o
Freeman Centre
Freeman Centre Centre
RRoo

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Cemetery Cemetery
Cemetery
Cemetery

Waterworks Waterworks
Waterworks
Waterworks

Suame Roundabout
Roundabout Suame
Suame Roundabout
Roundabout
Suame

The
The 1:25000
1:25000 The 1:25000
The 1:25000

mechanics dump toxic chemi- carcasses are scattered taking

cals, oil, as well as refuse into the up space. Some are abandoned
stream, which becomes a major others slowly being dissected into
human health problem especially small pieces used as second hand
during the rainy seasons. Waste spare-parts. 1:50000
oil is often spilled on the ground
to avoid dust and also to harden
the ground against erosion from
the stagnant water. In addition to
this, all over the Magazine vehicle World Bank - New Site - upgraded before 1994

Carcasses

11
Functional Description
The Magazine today includes vari-
ous artisans, general mechanics
as well as specialised mechanics,
spare-part dealer, welders, vul-
canizers etc. It is mainly a place
for vehicle repair and spare-part
dealers. However, more people are
beginning to live in The Magazine,
which brings along other activities
not necessarily associated with ve-
hicle repairing. Spare-part dealers
are taking over the business from
the mechanics, and new modern
electronically controlled vehicles
are coming into Ghana, which the
mechanics are not able to repair. The housing in the New Site often The Magazine is filled with chop
consists of small shacks made of bars, kiosks, provisions stores
In the Old Site, the majority of wooden boards with corrugated and bars. Street vendors selling
people are making a living on sell- iron roofs. Many of the inhabit- watches, fruit, and ice cream are
ing spare-parts.6 The Old Site is ants are restricted to live in the also a familiar sight all over the
easily accessed from the Offinso flooded areas close to the stream. Magazine. In the area with many
Road, which makes it suitable as a These areas are not suitable for residents other types of commer-
place for commerce. the workshops because of access cial activities such as hairdressers,
Today, it is also an area with a high problems and difficulties of driving tailors, and movie-stores appear.
frequency of inhabitants, often in vehicles on the swamped ground. Churches, mosques, schools, a
large two-story sandcrete buildings People living near the stream fitness gym, banks, and a health
that offers rooms for spare-part spend a lot of energy overcoming clinic can also be found within The
dealers on the ground floor and ac- the swamped ground by filling in Magazine.
commodation on the top floor. red soil, in order to create a solid
foundation for their houses.

6
Based on surveys conducted in zone 5

12
Magazine Experience
The intensity of the traffic is some-
what slower going deeper into The
Magazine. The roads are often
eroded and battered due to rain-
falls and overloaded heavy vehi-
cles. Drains have been construct-
ed in same places, but it appears
to be insufficient. The streets are
filled with large holes and at times
maliciously uneven surfaces. The
vehicles wobble down the roads
making it impossible to walk in only
one side of the road. In addition to
the rough surfaces, parked cars
and momentarily placed food-
stands also slow down the traffic.
At times traffic jams occur and
the travelling salesmen together
with workers carrying car-body-
parts assemble into loud crowds
struggling with their heavy loads.
Along the busy streets people are
passing women grilling plantains,
fruit stores offering bananas and
oranges presented on elegant iron-
rods displays - Magazine made.
Along the road, artisans and
spare-part dealers greet strangers
and acquaintances passing by. At
times it can be difficult to conduct a
conversation without being inter-
rupted from artisans cutting metal
or demanding attention. Once in
a while a prophet of doom passes
the area alerting Judgement Day
through a megaphone. Occasion-
ally, high pitch street preachers
put up several large speakers in
order to get their message across.
Despite of the overwhelming
volume there is little if any reaction
from the workers having a speaker
put up next to their worksite; no
one seems to be burdened to a
point where action is taken. In
areas where the fitters operate, the
sound level can be excruciating
but none of the workers are using
hearing aids.
The workers are running a risky
business. Car sprayers and
employees working with poison-
ous epoxy materials seldom use
masks. The occasional protection
consists of pulling a woollen scarf
or t-shirt over the mouth and nos-
trils. The welders also lack atten-
tiveness of the dangers in their line
of work. The result of using regular
sunglasses instead of welder’s
goggles is easily recognised talk-
ing to an old welder.
There is far between the street-
lights especially in the New Site,
but standing upon the sloping hill
in the Old Site, the flames from the
burning garbage within The Maga-
zine, help create a slight under-
standing of the size of The Maga-
zine. The blue glints lighting in the
distance and the black columns of
smoke coming from piles of burn-
ing tyres make the area resembles
a scenery from Blade Runner. In
the dusk, family houses now ap-
pear in between the worksites, and
the area becomes quiet.
All of the sudden the crickets are
heard serenading and because
of the Nkradam Stream a lot of
mosquitoes appear. The extrava-
gant mixture of activities during the
day is at night somewhat different.
At night, there are no longer au-
dible signs that remind you of the
mixture of residential and industrial
activities.
Late evening, the residential
houses appear even more astray
than during the daytime. Aside
from street-vendors leaving The
Magazine there are few activities
in the streets and there is hardly
ever any cars passing. Apart from
the spare-parts left outside of the
closed shops and welders in the
distance, the amount of industrial
activities that goes on during the
day can be hard to imagine.
13
Organisation
In the 1970’s around 98% of the
artisans belonged to the Magazine
Mechanical Association (MMA),
which was founded in 1957. This
association still controls plots in
the area and settles land disputes.7
Su
However, in the 1980’s the young- am
e
Ne
w
er generation of artisans formed Ro
ad

the Ghana National Association of

d
oa
oR

Garages (GNAG). Today, GNAG

ins
Off

is the main organisation, settling

land disputes, collecting tax, and in
general looking after its members’ Cemetery

interests. The main office of GNAG

is within The Magazine, but the
association has offices all over the
Ashanti region.

ad
Freeman Centre

Ro
ng
po
The Magazine is divided into 16
am
M

Cemetery

zones and further 8 zones have

emerged within Kumasi but outside Waterworks

The Magazine. The inconsistency

in numbering of the zones is a
Suame Roundabout
result of artisans setting up tempo-
rary workshops as well as the rapid The 1:25000

emergence of other “magazines” in

Kumasi. The zones are not visible
demarcated divisions of the land
but made for organisational pur-
poses. Zone 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 are
in the Old Site and 1, 8, 9, 11, 12,
13, 18, 19, 21, and 23 are in the
New Site. The remaining zones are
situated other places in Kumasi:
Zone 10 at Suame roundabout,
his zone of governmental issues to take care of disputes everyday.
concerning The Magazine. If it is If any problems occur, while taking
not possible to settle the disputes care of the disputes, a security
within the zone, the problem will man hired by GNAG is handling it.
be taken to the GNAG’s main of-
fice. According to the secretary of The official structure of The
GNAG, Kumi Koduah, they have Magazine is hierarchic, and very
Zone 10:
Suame Roundabout

Zone 14 at Krofrum, Zone 15 at Zone 14:

Krofrum
Sofoline, Zone 16 at Aspo, Zone
Zone 15:
17 at Ahensan, Zone 22 at Bejwai Sofoline

roundabout, Zone 20 at New Tafo, Zone 16:

14
and Zone 24 at Georgia Hotel. 20 Aspo
10
Zone 17:
Ahensan
Each Zone has a chairman and a 15
22 Zone 22:
treasurer. The chairman must take Bejwai Roundabout

care of whatever problem may Zone 20

occur within the zone, from dis- New Tafo

putes among individuals to general Zone 24:

Georgia Hotel
problems concerning e.g. lack of
16 Other Zones in the metro
electricity. Furthermore, the chair- 24
17
man has to inform the workers in Present site of the Magazine

7
George Yaw Obeng p.16

14

rigid. Within the structure knowl-
edge only moves vertically: from
the government, to the chairman
of GNAG, to the chairman of the
zone, and finally to the individual
member. Knowledge is not shared
directly between the individual
artisans on the bottom level of the
association. Informal knowledge
about the trades has to be shared
within social circles of friends and
family.
Other associations are working
in The Magazine taking care of
different interests: The Magazine
Spare-Parts Dealers Association,
Magazine Caterers Association,
Suame Intermediate Technology
Transfer Unit (ITTU), The Na-
tional Vocational Training Institute
(NVTI), The Ghana Regional
Appropriate Technology Indus-
trial Service Institute (GRATIS
Foundation), National Board for
Small-Scale Industries (NBSSI),
Technology Consultancy Centre
(TCC), Association of Small-Scale
Industries (ASSI), Association of
Ghana Industries (AGI), Council
for Scientific and Industrial Re-
search (CSIR), Empretec, Private
Enterprise Foundation (PEF),
Intermediate Technology Ghana
(ITG), DAPIT, and other NGOs.8
GNAG
8
George Yaw Obeng p. 15-17
9
Interview with Yaw Peprah
10
Interviews with Kumi Koduah, and Charles Ampomah, Metropolitan Engineer, KMA
11
Interview with Dickson Sarfo, chairman of zone 21
12
Interview with Charles Ampomah, Metropolitan Engineer, KMA
Landownership
The land in The Magazine is di- pay drink-money to the chief and
vided into 8 different areas con- ground-rent to KMA.11
trolled by 8 different chiefs: Tafo
Stool Lands, Nkontwima Stool KMA have tried to parcel out the
Land, Tarkwa-Markro Stool Land, land in the New Site, but it was
Nkofehene Stool Land, Ahensan- not effectuated and a number of
hene Stool Land, Asafohene Stool chiefs, who claimed having owner-
Land, and Mpintinkahene Stool ship of the land, started selling bits
Land. To begin with the plots were and pieces of the land to indi-
sold by the chiefs to individuals for viduals. Things changed when the
the purpose of making mechanical chiefs became aware of the money
workshops. Since there was no they could make on selling land.
regulation stating this, later inheri- People in Old Site started as ten-
tors of the plots have started using ants, but today many of them own
them for other more profitable their plots, and some have started
purposes such as stores.9 making permanent buildings and
houses. Buying land from the
Most artisans rent the plot on chiefs made it possible for the new
which they have their workshop owners to be in control of the land.
and thereby have no influence In addition, it created a sense of
on whether the owner chooses to security of tenance and freedom. 12
change the use of it. This appears
to be the main problem in the pres-
ent development of the Magazine.
Many plots have been purchased
by developers, or the owners have
chosen to build storey buildings
with spare-parts instead of work-
shops. Subsequently the work-
shops are forced to move and find
new land for their activities.
According to Kumi Koduah and
Charles Ampomah, Metropolitan
Engineer, KMA (Kumasi Metropoli-
tan Assembly), there have been
several disputes and lawsuits
concerning the ownership of the
land. Especially between GNAG
and the Tafo Chief, where it even
came to riots. This is also one of
the reasons why the World Bank,
who was working in New Site, sus-
pended all its activities. In the 90’s
people started buying land from
the chiefs instead of GNAG.10 One
of the problems at the moment, in
the Tafo Stool Lands, is that the
artisans renting plots both have to
The Tafo Chief
15
World Bank
In 1996 the World Bank started
a new project in The Magazine.
Ghana received loans for con-
struction of infrastructure, light-
ing, sanitation etc, in the Old Site
containing zone 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6.
A few years before the World Bank
had been involved in constructing
the roads of zone 1, 23, and part of
zone 21.13
Streetlights funded by World Bank
Essentially, the project was started
to make the area more acces-
sible. Moving from one area of The
Magazine to another was difficult,
and this slowed down business.
Implementing better infrastructure
was made to improve the business
and thereby reduce poverty. Im-
proving public toilets and well-man-
aged garbage disposal systems
would uplift the well being of the
ones using the areas. Streetlights
placed on the main roads to allow
the workers to feel safe and make
it possible for them to work longer
hours.14 Only few lampposts are
functioning today, which makes
it difficult to orientate after dark,
especially in the New Site.
In terms of accessibility and drain-
16
ing, the Old Site has improved
dramatically. The maintenance of
the lightning and the public toilets
were supposed to be maintained
by taxes collected by GNAG.
Unfortunately, this has not worked
because of quarrels within the
association. Initially, there was a
big area reserved for sanitation
and an resfuse disposal system.
The intention was that this should
be maintained on a daily basis,
but eventually the system broke
down.15
In the rainy season water does not
stagnate on the sloping hills of the
Old Site as opposed to the New
Site on the flat plain. This was one
of the reasons why the New Site,
according to the plan from 1963,
initially was reserved for agricul-
tural use. The Magazine grew and
finally the area on the flat plain be-
came an integral part of The Maga-
zine. The demand for new land
made The Magazine expand into
areas that are flooded in the rainy
season. According to Metropoli-
tan Engineer Charles Ampomah,
the encroachments have slowed
down the flow of the stream and
increased the problem of flooding.
Within the last five years roads
have been cut off by floods and
people have been evacuated from
the houses because this.16
Public toilet funded by World Bank
14
Interview with Charles Ampomah, Metropolitan Engineer, KMA
15
Interview with Charles Ampomah, Metropolitan Engineer, KMA
16
Interview with Charles Ampomah, Metropolitan Engineer, KMA
The Concept
of Clusters
Clusters can in general be catego-
rized as follows: The European
Archetypes, Large-small firm
clusters, High-technology small
and medium enterprises (SME)
clusters, Emergent less developed
country (LDC) SME clusters, and
LDC informal small enterprise clus-
ters. The Suame Magazine must
be considered as a LDC informal
small enterprise cluster. As op-
posed to the European clusters,
which are competing on innova-
tion, quality, and response to the
market, the LDC informal enter-
prise cluster lack support from
external institutions. The informal
knowledge of the trade is shared
between the artisans and the ap-
prentices without going through
any official channels. An average
workshop in The Magazine em-
ploys five workers and competes
on low prices and easy access to
cheap materials.17
One of the advantages of clusters
is the possibility of networking.
If one workshop does not have
a solution to a problem the next
one around the corner probably
has. The lack of advertisement
suggests that The Magazine as a
cluster is known all over Ghana.
Even though LDC informal small
enterprise clusters usually only
operate on a regional market, the
size of The Magazine indicates
that it is known in the adjoining
countries (Burkina Faso, Ivory
Coast, and Togo). As opposed to
The Magazine, the smaller size of
the clusters in Nairobi means that
they have to rely on the local and
regional market.18
Similar LDC informal small en-
terprise clusters can be found in
Nairobi, Kenya, but not as big
13
Interview with Kumi Koduah
17
Catherine Nyaki Adeya p. 9-11
18
Catherine Nyaki Adeya p. 9-11

as The Magazine. Kamukunji is
located within central Nairobi, 3 km
from The Central Business District,
almost the same central posi-
tion as The Magazine in Kumasi.
Kariobangi is found 15 km to the
east of Nairobi and is expanding
rapidly because of the position far
from the centre, where land prices
are higher. As opposed to The
Magazine, the clusters in Nairobi
also manufacture clothes and
paint along with the vehicle repair
and sale of spare-parts. As The
Magazine, the rapid expansion of
the Kariobangi cluster has resulted
from a “pooling” effect, where the
apprentices educated by the arti-
sans start new businesses within
the same area.19
When the World Bank funded an
education program called Micro
and Small Enterprise Training and
Technology Program (MSETTP)
you had to be a registered member
of the Kamukunji Jua Kali Associa-
tion to participate. Kamukunji Jua
Kali Association can be compared
to GNAG in The Magazine. There
was a huge interest even outside
Kamukunji from people who had
no connection to the area, but
wanted external support to up-
grade their skills. There used to be
a similar World Bank sponsored
program in The Magazine, where
the mechanics received external
training and had their skills up-
graded.20
Apprentice
19
Catherine Nyaki Adeya p. 9-11
20
Interview with Charles Ampomah, Metropolitan Engineer, KMA
21
Catherine Nyaki Adeya p. 15
Artisans and Apprentices
Education in The Magazine is
gained through informal knowledge
sharing. The artisans take in ap-
prentices whom they educate. In
2001, 74% of the artisans stated
that they had acquired their skills
being apprentices. 16% have had
a formal education, while the rest
either had learned it from practise
or experience.21
The apprentices pay a fee to the
artisan and sometimes they are ex-
pected to buy their own tools. How-
ever, while the training is going on,
the artisan pays an allowance to
the apprentice. The apprenticeship
will take at least 3 years, but usu-
ally longer. There are four stages
to pass before having learned the
trade: the preparatory stage, the
acquisitive stage, the imaginative
stage, and the innovative stage.
The preparatory stage (0-12
months): The apprentices have to
clean the workshop in the morn-
ing before the other workers come
to work. He is expected to watch
closely what the other apprentices,
workers, and the master is doing.
Sometimes he will even sleep in
the workshop and working as a
watchman.
The acquisitive stage (12-18
months): The apprentice learns
the basic skills. He usually stands
beside the master and follows his
instructions. The master will do the
specialized work and the appren-
tice will finish the last fitting.
The imaginative stage (12-18
months): The apprentice is be-
ginning to discuss the work and
techniques with the master. At
this stage he will probably have
advanced to a senior apprentice
and is working with other new ap-
prentices.
The innovative stage (12-18
months): This is the final stage in
the apprenticeship. The apprentice
knows how the job is carried out.
He is beginning to adopt trial and
error methods. Furthermore, he will
be able to make innovative altera-
tions to broken spare-parts, which
are expensive to buy. At this stage,
he is beginning to prepare starting
his own workshop and to become
a master himself.
After the apprentice is educated
there is no certificate to be given
to prove his skills. He has to rely
on people knowing him, or he
has to prove his skills every time
somebody wants work done. To
many educated apprentices it is a
problem that they do not have a
document proving their skills after
3-8 years of education.
Advertisement is barely used
among the workshops, except for
the painted facades of the shops
presenting the name, address
and telephone number and the
line of specific work. Besides the
facades other types of advertise-
ment are hardly ever used which
means that the shops have to rely
on references. Because many of
the workshops are specialized
there is a lot of work being out-
sourced within The Magazine. If a
customer arrives to The Magazine
without being knowledgeable of
a workshop capable of fixing the
specific problem, the customers
can contact GNAG for counseling.
Then GNAG will help the customer
by recommending a certain work-
shop. News about talented work is
spread by word of mouth.
17
Building Typologies
Residential shacks
Residential buildings
Residential Shacks
The residential shacks are wooden
and corrugated iron structures,
concentrated mostly along the
streams. The buildings seem
temporary but many of them have
been there for many years. Some
have concrete floors, but few win-
dows, and no water or sanitation.
They are 8-10 square metres and
often built in clusters. In each room
sleeps one family or two to three
persons. It is often tribes from
18
the northern part of Ghana who
resides in these shacks.
Residential Buildings
The residential buildings are
larger permanent structures built
in sandcrete with corrugated iron
roofs. They can be as big as 300
square metres in ground plan and
up to three storeys high. Usually,
they are houses built 40 years ago
when the first plan for The Maga-
Commercial shacks and containers

19
zine was made by the Town and
Country Planning Department. The
buildings accommodate from 15 to
50 persons.
Other residential buildings are one-
storey detached houses built within
the last 25 years by single families.
Usually, they house 10 persons,
but in case of additional extensions
up to 60 persons.
Commercial Shacks and
Containers
The commercial shacks and
containers are 15-20 square
metres and either holds work-
shops, spare-part dealers, or other
commercial activities as kiosks.
They are temporary wooden, iron,
and corrugated iron structures. In
case of workshops, the shacks are
storage for tools and other work
Commercial storey buildings
20
related articles. The place of work
is around the shack, and the work-
shop occupies maybe 10 times
as big an area as the shack itself.
In these workshops 3-10 persons
work from 6 in the morning until
6 in the evening. The spare-part
shacks and containers have a dis-
play in front, which mean that they
occupy an area twice their size.
Because it is only sale, few (1-5)
persons are employed in these
stores. Other commercial activities
carry out their sale or work within
the shacks. Only 1-3 persons work
in these places.
Commercial Storey
Buildings
The commercial storey buildings
are large permanent sandcrete
structures with a ground plan of
up to 300 square metres. They
are one to two storeys and contain
mostly spare-part dealers or stores
associated with for instance sale
of mobile phones or clothes. Some
buildings can hold 16 stores with
altogether 30-40 employees.
According to Charles Ampomah,
the development of larger sand-
crete structures started in the
mid-eighties and at the same time
people started living in the area.
In the seventies and the early
eighties many of the workers in
The Magazine where not as well
to do as some are today, but in
the mid-eighties and the nineties,
those who sold spare-parts started
making more profit. Some of these
spare-part dealers are among the
wealthiest men in Ghana today.
Before the mid-eighties the spare-
part dealers used to be in the
same low-income group as the me-
chanics. Eventually, they started
Mixed use buildings

developing their business, which Mixed Use Storey he lives elsewhere and the first
made it possible for some of them floor is for rent. In the Old Site,
to invest in permanent buildings.22 Buildings these buildings have water and
The mixed use storey buildings sanitation. The mixed use build-
When Ghana’s economy started are of the same type as the com- ings are located on light-industrial
worsen the import of new cars mercial storey buildings. However, plots, which is not according to the
stopped. People continued driving instead of two storeys of shops, KMA’s plan. It probably developed
old cars and the need for spare- there are shops on the ground in this way because of the upgrad-
parts increased. The old cars floor and accommodation on the ing of the infrastructure and other
needed a lot more maintenance first floor. Sometimes the owner facilities which attracted potential
and the spare-part dealers profited of the building lives with his family inhabitants.
because of this. The appearance on the first floor, and sometimes
of the Forex exchange bureaux
gives a sound idea of the money
that is being made in this area. The
local monetary standard is de-
valued to an extend where larger
business deals are done in USD.
The master craftsmen and the
ones who became wealthy on the
industry are not primarily the ones
living in the Magazine today. They
only build the houses and make
money on collecting rent. Often
they dislike the noisy environment
and pollution and live outside the
Magazine.23

Forex exchange bureaux by Offinso Road

22
Interview with Charles Ampomah
23
Interview with Charles Ampomah

21
Description of Each Zone
Zone 1 is part of the first World The zone is situated in a corner of Zone 3, 4, 5 and 6 border on
Bank project and is laid out as a The Magazine next to the water- zone 2, with the same structure
grid. It borders Mampong Road, works and the Methodist church to- caused by the World Bank project.
where mostly workshops are wards the south. The zone mostly Towards Offinso road, there are
located. The space appears open consists of two-storey sandcrete large residential buildings with
due to the fact that it is situated buildings with spare-part dealers spare-part dealers in front – both
next to the cemetery. The area on the ground floor and storage or in sandcrete storey buildings and
consists mainly of smaller sand- accommodation on top. Between smaller shacks. A commonly found
crete buildings containing either these buildings, shacks containing structure towards the Offinso Road
workshops or spare-part dealers. workshops as well as large sand- is a U-shape, with the courtyard
Many places, buildings are in two crete residential buildings can be towards the road. In the bottom of
storeys, with accommodation, of- found. The residential housing has the U-shape lies a large sandcrete
fices, or storage on the first floor. the highest frequency along Of- building with spare-part dealers
Where there is only one storey, finso Road, but also appears within and other commercial stores.
iron rods sometimes indicate that the zone. Towards the stream, the On both edges are shacks and
the owner plans to build an addi- buildings gradually transforms into containers situated. Behind the U-
tional storey to the building. more temporary shacks for both shapes there are mostly two storey
sandcrete buildings with stores on
the ground floor and accommoda-
tion on the top. Towards the stream
the plots get smaller and the build-
ings change into more temporary
shacks with workshop. Close to
the stream, where no plots are
Su
am
planned and the area is occasion-
e
ally flooded during rainy seasons,
Ne
w
Ro
ad

temporary residential shacks can

d
oa

be found. In the entire area, people

oR
ins

from the north watch the work-

Off

shops and stores during night.

Cemetery
Zone 7 is bordering on zone 6.
Mixed use plots
However, the zone is not part
Light-industrial plots

of the 1971 plan and has not

received World Bank funding.
Nevertheless, the zone lies within
ad

Freeman Centre
Ro
ng

the same infrastructure, which

po
am
M

Cemetery
means that the roads have devel-
oped in the same way, connecting
Waterworks
the area to both Offinso Road and
The U-shape
Suame New Road. Because of
Suame Roundabout
disputes between the Tarkwa Chief
The 1:25000
and KMA the area has not been
planned as an industrial area. Still,
KMA will not recognize it as a resi-
Zone 2 is in the area of the latest housing and commercial use. A dential area. The disagreements
World Bank project. Infrastructure, church is also found next to a gas between The Chief and KMA have
sanitation and water are found in station within the zone. Mixed use plots
caused the area, in some parts
Light-industrial plots

this zone and the roads are paved. developing into a residential areaMixed use plots

1:800

22
with large sandcrete houses while
other parts have developed into a
mixture of shacks for accommoda-
tion and workshops. Like in zone
2-6, there are also many sandcrete
buildings with spare-part shops on
the ground floor and accommoda-
tion on top. Because of the higher
frequency of housing in this area,
more functions can be found. In
the shacks towards the stream you
find different commercial functions
as tailors, barbers, music-stores,
kiosks, and even a fitness centre.
Like in the other zones bordering
the stream, there are clusters of
residential shacks.
Zone 8 is bordering Old Tafo. With-
in the area there are workshops
handling smaller vehicles and
along the Suame New Road and
Mampong Road there are spare-
part dealers. No one is sleeping in
the area apart from watchmen. The
Town and KMA have not parcelled
out plots, which mean that the
roads have developed according
to the accessibility needs of those
owning the workshops.
Zone 9 and 11 are not planned
and the roads have developed ac-
cording to the turning circle of the
trucks passing through the area.
As opposed to zone 8, larger ve-
hicles are serviced here. The zone
mostly consists of spare-part deal-
ers along the Suame New Road
and workshops within the area.
Along the two streams smaller
shacks with occasional housing
are found. However, the amount
of people sleeping in the area is
considered to be minimal.
Zone 12 has been pushed by the
residential area of Breman, and
has almost shrunk to only being
workshops and spare-part deal-
ers along the Suame New Road.
In 15 years the area has gone
from covering an area of 20 ha to
4 ha. The area is located near the
city centre of Kumasi and sought
after for residential purposes. The
mechanic activities that use to be
in the area did not have the size
to be able to resist the housing
Selection Criteria
overtaking the place.
In order to find out how many
Zone 13 is consisting of work-
people live and work in the differ-
shops handling larger vehicles.
ent building typologies and in the
Along the stream shacks with oc-
entire Magazine, we decided to se-
casional habitation can be found.
lect two areas containing all the ty-
Like zone 9 and 11, the roads are
pologies. Furthermore, we wanted
not planned and have developed
to cover the variety of people living
according to the people using
and working in The Magazine:
them.
The people living in The Magazine
and working outside, those living
Zone 18 is totally surrounded by
and working in The Magazine, and
other zones. In this zone there are
finally the people living outside and
no residential shacks. This area is
working inside. Also, we wanted to
almost only workshops servicing
investigate an area affected by ex-
large trucks. No one sleeps in this
ternal development like the World
area except the watchmen guard-
Bank project.
ing the area.
Zone 19 is a very small area part-
ed from the rest of The Magazine
by Mampong Road. It almost only
consists of workshops along the
road with little commercial activity B
behind. There are no houses or
residential shacks in this zone.
A
Zone 21 is divided into two parts.
One is like zone 1 part of the
first World Bank project, and is
therefore laid out as a grid. It is
mostly sandcrete buildings with
workshops or stores on the ground
floor and accommodation on the
top floor. The other part of zone 21
stretches along the stream sepa- The
rating the Old and the New Site
of The Magazine. Many people of
Because our main focus is how
the Northern part of Ghana inhabit
people live in The Magazine, we
this area. Zone 21 is one of the
selected areas with the highest
zones in New Site with the highest
concentration of habitation. We
concentration of residents.
chose two areas of each ½ ha
where visual indications of habita-
Zone 23 is like zone 1 and part of
tion supported our assumption.
zone 21 a grid structure caused by
This made us chose an area in
the first World Bank project. The
zone 5 and an area in zone 7. We
zone contains mostly sandcrete
conducted quantitative surveys
buildings with stores or workshops
to reveal how many people were
on the ground floor and occasion-
living and working within these two
ally accommodation on the top
areas.
floor. The head office of GNAG is
situated in this area along with a
health clinic and a bank.
23
Area A

The 1:2000

Offinso Road The slanting road makes the driv- new wall of sound will overwhelm
ers push their vehicles to the limit. the one who enters deeper into
The topography near Offinso Road
The soundscape is a constant The Magazine. In the area close to
makes it possible to have a diminu-
mixture of squeaking tires, engines the Offinso Road there a majority
tive overview of The Magazine
on the verge together with honk- of spare-part dealers, whose line
from the junctions going into area
ing horns, and large overloaded of business is not as noisy as the
A. On the other hand, standing in
trucks speeding downhill. Crossing ones straightening cars or disman-
front of the two-story high sand-
the four lanes of the Offinso Road tling engine-blocks.
crete structure the appearances
at places where the rising is steep
of the buildings located behind it
can be a dangerous pursuit. The plots next to the Offinso Road
are left unknown. Strolling down
are planned as mixed used plots.
the road the area appears to be a
East of the Offinso Road the area Spare-part dealers, workshops,
huge cluster of car fitters side by
slopes down to the Nkradam and other smaller service shops
side with second-hand spare-part
Stream. The rolling hills function as such as telecommunication cen-
shops. Along the road oil-greased
a sound barrier for noise coming tres and chop bars, occupy the
spare-parts are displayed next to
from the Offinso Road. Soon a buildings next to the road. Some
shiny hubcaps and rear-view-mir-
rors reflecting the sun. From a
distance it is possible to see black
smoke from a workshop burning
worn-out tires. These impressions
make the discovery of several
two-story accommodation build-
ings behind the mass of business
activities even more intriguing.

Offinso Road

24
of the buildings facing the street
consist of rectangular two-storey
high sandcrete structures. These
buildings have a flat roof often with
iron rods reaching towards the
sky alerting the construction of an
additional floor. The plane roofs
are often used for scrap piles or as
storage of spare-parts. A television
repair shop on the first-floor uses
the roof for discarded television
screens.
Commercial storey building by Offinso Road
In front of the large buildings laid
out parallel to the Offinso Road
smaller one-storey sandcrete
structures runs crossways to
the road, forming u-shapes and
demarcating the plots. They have
sheet metal roofs functioning as
eaves or canopies. During the
day wooden benches are brought
out for the workers to gather in
the shade. In some of the shops
the spare-parts take up most of
the space, forcing several of the
workers to rest outside under the
canopies. There seems to be a lot
of leisure time in between jobs.
During these periods some of
the employees make social visits
across the square. Others read
The Daily Graphic, sleeps, listens
to the radio or plays ludo.
Small wooden shacks are spread
along the roadside. Chop-bars,
telephone-card vendors and
people offering phone calls from
mobile phones frequently occupy
these shacks. The food trade is of-
ten run by a couple of ladies serv-
ing fried rice with chicken, kenke,
fu-fu, and banku together with soft
drinks or cold water in transparent
plastic bags. There is no electric-
ity available in the food stands, so
beverages and food provisions are
kept cold in thermo boxes. After
placing an order the meals are
immediately heated on gas stoves
or over sparkling mobile charcoal
Mixed use plots
Mixed use plots
Mixed use plots
Mixed use plots
Mixed use plots
Mixed use plots
stoves. Chop-bars offering a place
to sit regularly provide soap and a
bowl with water for the customers
to wash their hands. The difficulties
of rinsing off oil make many of the
workers use a fork or a spoon, as
opposed to the norm of eating with
the right hand. Besides the food
stands, there are plenty of whis-
tling, insistent street vendors con-
stantly demanding attention. These
street vendors also offer cold tap
water poured in plastic bags, fresh
fruit, ice-cream, meat pie, watches
and toothbrushes all displayed
and carried on their heads. Being
a street vendor near the Offinso
Road is seemingly a hazardous oc-
cupation. The merchants run into
the street every time the cars slow
down, and while gathering around
the passing cars, they perform a
high pace trade.
Light-industrial plots
Light-industrial plots
Light-industrial plots
Light-industrial plots
Light-industrial plots
Light-industrial plots
Mixed use plots
Mixed use plots
Mixed use plots
1:800
1:800
1:800
25
26
The

The
Of Of
fin fin
so so
Ro R oa
ad d

1:800

1:800
Physical Appearance
of the Buildings
The larger sandcrete buildings
located on the plots next to the
Offinso Road look very much alike.
The entrances to the shops consist
of an opening with large metal
doors. The door openings are often
the same height and width as the
measurements of the shops.
The buildings seem to be designed
Sliding doors in one of the buildings facing Offinso Road
after the same formula, they are
all rectangular shaped boxes. The
variation is sparse and consists of
the fainted coloured fronts of the
shops. The painted frescos often
resemble spare-parts sold in the
specific store. The colours of the
often-used rusted sheet metal
roofs have a resemblance to the
red soil covering the ground. The
tarpaulins laid out in front of the
stores, for protection of the spare-
parts, also share the same dusty
palette of fainted colours. The
spare-parts are often stored or
displayed outside the shops. The
displays and repetitions of either
oil-greased or rust-coloured spare-
parts become a decorative part of
the scenery. Other shops store the
same types of spare-parts in large
piles, which make the goods look
like indifferent loads of wreckage.
In our survey area next to the
Offinso Road there are only few
spare-part dealers that have
displayed their goods in a notice-
able organized mode. Inside some
of the spare-part shops it can be
hard to see whether the goods
have been abandoned or stored
for upcoming sale purposes. Sev-
eral places flat wooden structures
have been laid out for storage of
spare-parts. The structures protect
the spare-parts from rusting do to
stagnant water on the ground. In
periods when there is no need for
storage space besides the shops
the wooden structures are left on
the ground taking up space. Be-
sides the wooden structures there
are also workshops expanding
their enterprises, on the space sur-
rounding their workshops, leaving
little space for getting around.
Between Buildings
While doing quantitative interviews
in our selected survey area, we
met Thomas Owusu Ansah, or
Tommy the Glass-dealer as he
introduces himself. He is the owner
of one of the worksites next to
the Offinso Road. The workshop
is a small wooden shack situated
under a big tree casting shadow on
the shop’s rusted sheet metal roof.
The ground plan measures 3x2.8
metres, and the inside of the shop
is used for storage of spare-parts
and tools. There are six employ-
ees, but it is seldom that there are
activities enough to occupy them
all at the same time. Tommy sells
and repairs new and second-hand
car-windows.
The location seems suitable for the
enterprise. At times when Tommy
Thommy the Glass-dealer’s workshop
and his colleagues have many
cars in need of replacement of
windows, the cars are parked on
the plot while being repaired and
the free space becomes sparse.
This makes the access to the other
stores difficult and it becomes
necessary to move along the ad-
jacent buildings. On this particular
plot Tommy’s business is the only
workshop that actually performs
car-repar on the site. During our
quantitative interviews with some
of the other shop owners on the
plot, we became aware that they
too would like space for carrying
out vehicle repairs.
Sometimes cars are parked in front
of the Chop-bar and the window-
screen-replacements are done
right next to dining customers.
The scenery is normal all over The
Magazine. The effect of not having
sharp drawn boundaries around
the workshops is that various
programmes coexist at the same
place and time (light-industrial
activities and daily life activities).
On the ground glass is scattered
all around Tommy’s workshop.
The glass being used is seldom
the hardened kind that burst into
millions of harmless small pieces
but the kind that breaks into large
sharp flakes, making it necessary
to pay great alertness walking
around without getting cut.
27
28
The
The
Of Of
fin fin
so so
Ro R oa
ad d

1:800

1:800
 The
The
Of Of
fin fin
so so
Ro R oa
ad d

1:800
1:800

29
 Mixed use plots Light-industrial plots

Residential Buildings Nelson there is no one living in cial building in front of it. When
the building. He tells us that he entering the narrow access way
Tommy’s uncle Samson Frimpong
has worked out an agreement one gets the feeling of imposing
owns the plot were Tommy’s work-
with one of the shop owners on a private space. It is not a place
shop is situated. Samson Frim-
the first-floor who is selling mo- where unacquainted people pass
pong has a spare-part shop here
bile phones. Nelson is allowed to by.
and he is the landlord of all of the
sleep upon the staircase between
buildings on the plot. He lives with
the ground floor and the first-floor
his family in an apartment located
on the condition that he works
on the backside of his spare-part
as a watchman during nighttime.
shop.
Nelson has been sleeping in the
building for the past eight months.
When accessing the corridor to
His aunt helped him get a job in a
the residential houses you stumble
spare-part shop located next to her
upon several spare-parts. Inside
food-stand, on the same plot as
the courtyard a large pile of spare-
he sleeps. He has worked out an
parts is being stored upon wooden
agreement with the shop-owner,
boards. Children are playing –run-
who lives together with his wife in The courtyard
ning among the pile of spare-parts
the building behind Nelson, that in
while greeting us: “Obroni”. Many Mixed use plots Light-industrial plots
the evening he helps her pound fu- Clothes are hanging between
of the tenants living in the two-sto-
fu and afterwards he can join the the buildings to dry and women
rey house are relatives to Samson Mixed us
family for dinner. gather to prepare food while
Frimpong.
others are resting in the shade
upon the stairs on both sides of 1:800

the house. Women and children

assemble anxiously as we enter
the courtyard. The surrounding
industrial and commercial activi-
ties are hardly noticed standing in
the courtyard. The open space is
sparse and because of the small
distance between the tall walls, the
acoustics make the sound of play-
ing children and the fu-fu pounding
more present than the noise of the
surrounding Magazine.
The house of Samson Frimpong

The women are preparing dinner in

In the house where Nelson sleeps
the courtyard in front of the build-
there are several commercial ac-
ing, while youngsters hang out on
tivities that does not have a direct
the stairs leading to the veranda.
connection to the other businesses
Samson Frimpong has started
in The Magazine. In this building it
building two additional storage
is possible to locate a cell-phone
rooms on the plot. Today the unfin-
vendor, a television repair shop,
ished construction functions as a
a driving school, an insurance
place for drying clothes.
company, as well as a ladies fash-
ion centre. Next to where Nelson
On the plot next to Samson
sleeps the cell-phone vendor has
Frimpongs’ we meet a twenty-one-
an additional storage room that
year-old boy, Nelson, who lives on
Nelson guards.
the staircase in the commercial
building facing the street. He is
The only access to the residential
originally from Tamale but came
building consists of a 1.2 metre
to Kumasi to find work. Apart from
narrow path next to the commer- Nelsons home

30
Going into the
Magazine
During the day the noisy work-
shops fill up the area, but when the
workshops close the residential
buildings becomes more notice-
able. This is not only because
these buildings light up at night
time, but also as a consequence
of the amount of alertness the
workshop activities are demanding
during the day. Passing through
the light industrial area during the
day, a large intoxicating cocktail of
various sounds and smells greets
visitors during working hours. At
times the pungent stench extends
the floating physical barrier of the
workshops and makes it difficult to
pass by without feeling nauseous.
The same goes with the level of
sounds that for outsiders might
seem to exceed the tolerable.
The house of Josef Asante
One afternoon we are invited to
visit Josef who lives on the 2nd
floor on top of a house with spare-
part dealers at the ground floor. He
is calling us from the veranda and
in a friendly and casually manner
invites us into his living room. The
room is 3x5 meters and furnished
with two red plush couches deco-
rated with large ornamentation
shining like gold. At the end of the
room there is a mantelpiece with
a television set on top of a DVD-
player. There is no light coming
through the drapes in front of the
windows, but a naked green bulb
hanging from the ceiling lit up the
room. On each side of the living
room his two teenage daughters
have their individual rooms cov-
ered with idol posters and piles
of stacks shoes. Besides his two
daughters, Josef Asante lives with
his wife who at this moment has
left town to attend a funeral.
The family has been living in the
building for the past eight years.
It was the Mechanical Association
that gave Josef the land. Before
the two-storey sandcrete building
was built, Josef had a small wood-
en shack from were he ran his
straightening enterprise. Today he
The house of Josef Asante
pays rent to the government and
collects tolls from the other shop
owners in the building. He is the
owner and landlord of the building
and the director of a spare-part
shop on the ground floor.
The style and mixture of pro-
gramme (housing and sparepart-
dealers) is typical for many of the
houses in Old Site. In this apart-
ment there are four rooms: one
for each of the daughters, a living
room, and a bedroom for Josef
and his wife. He is continuously
improving his premises: recently
he renovated the façade of the
building and now he is putting up
tiles in the bathroom and toilet
matching the floor on the veranda.
The first floor veranda facing east
is the access path to the adjoin-
ing rooms and is at the same time
functioning as an additional living
room for the family. The roof of
the building works as an eave that
shades the veranda, which makes
it possible for the family to rest out-
side during the day. Because of the
sloping hill and the fact that they
live on the first floor it is possible
to have a good overview of The
Magazine. During the day it is pos-
sible for Josef to interact with the
workers underneath the veranda,
while at the same time being able
to draw back to the privacy of the
veranda.
Josef finished school in 1968 and
the year after he came to work in
The Magazine as a straightener
and welder. He was born in Buoho,
a small village eight miles from Ku-
masi. Today Josef no longer works
in The Magazine but occasionally
he goes to Buoho to carve stones.
His wife and daughters work
outside of their house selling local
dishes from a chop-bar and from
the first floor veranda it is possible
for Josef to stay in touch with them
while they work.
An hour later, we step out of the
living room onto the veranda,
noticing how peaceful the area
has become. Joseph says that at
eight a clock in the evening the
entire place is usually quiet and he
is able to get a good night’s sleep.
The dramatic change in sound
volume from when we arrived till
now makes it easy to relate to his
statement.
31
Area B

The 1:2000

The Nkradam Stream We are trying to locate the chair- found towards the north. South of
man of the zone, since we know the area workshops building bus-
We have entered The Magazine
that it is good custom to introduce ses and handling larger vehicles
from the Suame New Road and
oneself before entering an area. are found. East of the stream
have been moving through an
In the shade of some trees we find is New Site with its temporary
area of large vehicle workshops
a group of men working. While wooden structure workshops.
between rusty bus bodies, trying
explaining our project one of the
not to look into the alluring white
Masters, Kofi arrives. He takes us The functions inside Area B are
flames of the welders. We have
to James Dzimasah, the chairman gathered in clusters. The auto
passed glistering, newly painted
of zone 7 who is also working as mechanical workshops have easy
cars still with the sweet odour of
a mechanic. James welcomes us, access to the road. The spare-
solvents in the air. As we cross the
pleased to hear that we will not part dealers and other commercial
stream that runs through the area
need personal assistance to do our shops are situated along the busy
the path turns into a small steel
research. passage leading to the bridge.
bridge. The crossing is a busy
Some permanent residential build-
passageway and though the water
There are two ways of arriving to ings are sharing a garden with the
is low, it is not appealing to trip
the area. One is by car from Of- neighbouring houses. Next to the
into the soft colourful riverbanks of
finso Road, following first a sloping stream is a residential settlement
scattered plastic bags, household
paved and then a gravel road. An- of small wooden shacks located.
refuse, and human waste. Safe
other possibility is to arrive at the Two of the family-houses have a
across we are met by music play-
bottom of the area. The Nkradam bar attached, both facing an open
ing from small shops along a steep
Stream is running through and area. In between them is an en-
narrow path. Next to the stream
from this side access is only possi- closure with a workout fitness gym
behind the shops is a clearing with
ble by foot. On the West side of the established.
boys playing football. Laundry is
area larger sandcrete structures of
hanging covering the front of some
mixed use are situated. Housing is
wooden shacks.

32
 Football field

1:800

Football field

The 1:800

33
The Artisans’
Workshops
On the roadside of area B is a
small container housing a bar-
bershop. Colourful posters with
photos of hairstyles are signalling
the business. We are welcomed by
Isak the barber, while he is busy
trimming a customer. Afterwards
he poses for a photo in front of his
shop, as his sister is sitting at the
side under a parasol selling phone
calls on her mobile phone.
Area B
Another container is owned by
Comfort Breya who runs a spare-
part shop. It is the first building in
a row of wooden shacks stretching
into the area. The row consists of
small houses connected with open
sheds of corrugated sheet metal
roofs. In front of the workshops is
an open space lying in the shade
of some trees. Situated at the end
of the row is a small sandcrete
foundation with a canopy. The
workshop next to it has built this as
a Muslim praying place. Since we
have already introduced ourselves
to the workshop where Samuel is
a master, people working there are
more than willing to help us with
listing the names of the employ-
ees. Generally the workers are
auto mechanics, electricians, weld-
ers and painters.
34
The main work field in this area row a watchman lives with his wife
has to do with repairing vehicles. and child. The Wooden shacks
As previously described, the main are all similar and it is difficult to
workspaces are outside and often distinguish his home from the
cover 10 times the area of the workshops.
small workshop-shacks. The actual
buildings have anonymous appear-
ances without any signposting. It is
the presence of cars that make the
workshops visible. The workspace
areas change according to the
amount and character of the work.
The mechanics use the space
closest to the workshop-shacks
Workshop
The Shopping Street
Inside a small container behind
the Muslim praying place, we find
a young man named Oseri, who is
dressed remarkably businesslike.
He sells utensils for the workshops
such as sandpaper and welding-
for minor repairs. Some work can
thread. He also has a spare part
take weeks, and additional space
shop next to Offinso Road. The
for this is found underneath some
conditions are quite different for
large trees in the middle of Area
the two shops. In area B he has
B. The painters’ workspace takes
had the shop for about a year and
up a larger part of the open area.
may be told to move anytime since
Their work is sensitive to dust and
the church owns the land. At the
rain, so in addition they have an
Offinso roadside his father owns
open shelter to move into.
the plot.
A scent of fried chicken and cab-
Large busses build from scratch lie
bage stew mix with the hot dusty
like stranded skeletons of whales.
breeze.on the backside of Samuels
In between the bodies we see a
workshop where we meet Abena
couple of apprentices hanging out
Serwaa. She has been working
in the shade of a shelter made of
here for 8 years selling food from
an old van. This is where they go
her brightly coloured wooden stall.
during their breaks.
She arrives at 10.00 in the morn-
ing to prepare the food - ready to
The sloping path towards the
serve it at 2 pm. This space also
stream is eroded. It is a busy pas-
functions as a resting place for
sage leading to the bridge with
lunchtime visitors. Within the same
 Football field

The 1:800

small shops on each side. Narrow
openings between the buildings
connect the path with the settle-
ment behind. The similar structures
and functions on each side of the
stream make a clear correlation
between zone 7 and New Site.
Lisbeth Serwah is sitting behind
the lace drapes in the entrance of
a small container. From here she
runs a dressmaker shop. Her sister
Philomine is paying her a visit on
her walk around The Magazine
selling toothpaste. They both grew
up in a house at the northern side
of area B and Philomine still lives
there.
The front of a shop is covered
completely in Kansas work-clothes,
and inside we find the owner
Mercy Boakye greeting us. While
we are talking small children are
gathering under the canopy.
Next to Mercy’s shop is an open
wooden shed containing a huge
pile of old worn-out black leather
shoes. They belong to Oscar.
“I sell them to the work-
ers” he says “they often
buy them one at the
time. They don’t have
much money and they
need good strong shoes
for work”.

“This is Mercy’s little

helpers”
she says. She has thirteen children
coming to help her unpack the
goods.

The shopping Street Oscar

35
 Football field

The 1:800

The fitness gym

36
Walking past the workshops we
are called by one of the workers.
He leads us through a crooked
door in an enclosure of corru-
gated iron sheets in the shade of
some mango trees. We are utterly
surprised by the sight that meets
us – iron-pumping bodybuilding
musclemen working out, within
what looks like a “hen house” from
the outside. They pose in front of
a mirror showing off their body-
works, trying to outdo each other.
The training-equipment is made in
The Magazine from old vehicles
parts.
The Compound
Located next to the barbershop is
a house which appears residential.
The front of the building is fac-
ing the road and has a covered
veranda where two elderly women
are sitting. We are surrounded
by neighbourhood children, as
we meet a young woman wash-
ing clothes. Her name is Faustina
and she grew up in this house
as her mother and grandmother
before her. It turns out that what
looked as some separate concrete
buildings on the 2002 aerial photo
have been joined into a large
compound-like structure around an
open courtyard. Parts of the walls
are still unpainted, and new roofing
indicates, that the present struc-
ture has been altered or extended.
The south side of the family house
towards the workshops has a
wooden extension with a curtain
covering the entrance. Inside is a
bar run by one of the ladies living
in the family house. After school
her daughter helps her until 10pm
when they close for the night.
A small stream runs from the road
between the house and the work- The Settlement
shop area to the Nkradam Stream
We move to the lower part of the
at the bottom. Near the courtyard
area to the wooden shacks next
is a storage-shed, which belongs
to the stream. We stride towards
to two of Faustinas uncles - Mr.
the settlement, and is as usual
Manquar and Mr. Kofi Jesus who
met by a crowd of children smiling
have a carpenter’s workshop on
and shouting obroni! The children
the other side of the small stream.
call for a young man who speaks
English. His name is Kofi and he is
When we address their workshop
happy to assist us with translation.
later in the week, the man we get
He is part of the Builsa Tribe from
to talk to is extremely defensive.
the Upper East Region and lives
here with his family. The settlement
“You cannot be walking lies hidden behind the line of small
around here on your own shops and at the foot of two con-
crete family-houses. Kofi explains
- handing out papers and
that the one next to the shops be-
asking questions about long to the woman who owns the
peoples work! How do land they live upon. Some of the
we know that you are not buildings in the northern edge of
the settlement are attached to the
doing some kind of crim- wall of the other concrete house.
inal investigation? How
do we know that you
don’t have dynamite in
your bag and want to dig
a hole under here and
blow away the place?”
We show him the papers from
KNUST and explain that we have
been talking to both GNAG and the
Chairman but he is not satisfied...
He is busy and walks away…so do
we.
Inside a residential shack
On the backside of the fitness cen-
tre is an open space for cooking in
the shade of some trees.
The shacks right behind the shop-
ping-street belongs to the Builsa
Family house
37
tribe. They form a small courtyard
which is a place for household
activities. The neighbouring shacks
are built by Frafra people also from
the Upper East Region. We have
language difficulties and some
have left for a funeral so we do not
get the exact number of people
living there. Kofi tells us that many
more of the Frafra people are living
around in the workshop-area on
the other side of the stream.
The football field
The site of the settlement is lo-
cated on a steep hill. Small sheds
are placed in the perimeter of the
settlement towards the stream.
Some are toilets and others are
for bathing. The wastewater runs
directly into the stream, which is
already filled with rubbish and
refuse. A woman sits in front of one
of the shacks outside area B and
calls us. She greets us and proudly
shows us her small wooden house.
“But the problem is too
much toilet”
she says and point towards the
stream. In the grass a small dog
is playing around with a pig that is
busy munching in the riverbed. The
boys are showing off their football
skills in the open field as the sun
38
sets and the welding flashes from
the workshops shine brightly in
the twilight. The electric welders
are the first to come in the morn-
ing and the last to leave in the
evening. This is the time when the
power is sufficient enough for their
equipment.
The Landlady
The clock has past 6pm and there
is a steady flow of people passing
the bridge heading home. On the
other side of the stream, music is
playing from a lighted shed. This
is a bar that comes to life after
The Landlady
working hours. The provision store
on the sloping path is still open
and the lights lead the way on
the bumpy surface. Together with
some scattered lights under the
trees the workshop area is like an
empty stage set after the show.
We are going to see the landlady
in the concrete house close to the
settlement. A man greets us and
offers us a seat in plastic arm-
chairs. His name is Baah and he is
married to the landlady who owns
the house and the plot. He leads
the conversation focusing on the
lack of hospitals and schools in the
area. These are the main problems
as he sees it being an inhabitant in
The Magazine for many years. The
house is a rectangular concrete
building with a wooden structure
in front which contains cooking-
space and a bar. The entrance to
the building is through a veranda
facing the workshop area of the
car-sprayers. In the evening the in-
dustrial workspace is taken over by
leisure activities. As we are leaven-
ing, people are gathering outside
the house in the light to see a
football match on television. The
air is filled with cheerful excitement
replacing the usual hammering
and pounding of The Magazine.
The Bulsa tribe
Interviews
In order to gain a further under-
standing of the inhabitants and
working force in our two selected
sites, we decided to make a series
of quantitative interviews.
The surveys were done in order
to shed a light on the tenants
and landowners. The quantitative
interviews worked as a two-way
introduction and as the base for
picking out our cases. Through our
surveys we tried to gain a clearer
picture of where people originated
from, and where workers working
in The Magazine today were living.

Number of people living in survey area A

Lives and works in the same area: 8

A
65 Total

Number of people living in survey area B

Lives and works in the same area: 5

Originally from the Kumasi area: 60+

B
141+

39
People working in survey area A People working in survey area B

Auto-mechanical artisans: 22 Auto-mechanical artisans: 50

Spare part dealers: 88 Spare part dealers: 7

Other commercial activities: 22 Other commercial activities: 26+

Lives in Kumasi: 103 Lives in Kumasi 83+

Total number of people working: 83+

Originally are from Kumasi: 70

Total number of people working: 122

Portraits of The Magazine

People working in survey area B

Auto-mechanical artisans: 50

Spare part dealers: 7

Other commercial activities: 26+

Lives in Kumasi 83+

Total number of people working: 83+

40
Yaw Peprah
A Thursday afternoon we come to
The Magazine. From the busy Of-
finso Road with people selling ev-
erything from old worn out engine
blocks to brand new Mercedes
hub caps, we walk down through
Old Site. Behind the first two rows
of buildings containing spare-part
shops and residences we turn right
and onto a narrow dirt road going
parallel to Offinso Road.
People are getting ready to call it a
day. They are sitting outside their
shops playing draughts and ludo.
Some are covering up the large
piles of spare-parts or taking them
inside their stores. As always when
we come to The Magazine, people
shout at us:
“Where are you going?”
and as always we stop and explain
the purpose of our visit. Today we
are going to interview the treasurer
of zone 5, Yaw Peprah.
Yaw Peprah
As we approach his workshop
with pump repairing, we can see
that he is not around. Some of his
11 apprentices are sitting around
on the benches in the shade of
the corrugated iron roof, while the
master apprentice is finishing the
work on the last pump of the day.
We are told that Yaw soon will be
back and while we wait, we get
into talking with a journalist who is
also waiting for him.
8 months ago Yaw was on a
radio program where the journal-
ist interviewed him about The
Magazine and the work carried
out here. Apparently people where
complaining about the poor work
done in The Magazine, and Yaw
as one of the spokesmen of the
area had to explain, that because
people choose to replace the
broken car parts with second hand
spare-parts, the mechanics cannot
control the quality of the work. Yaw
claims that if people instead used
new spare-parts there would not
be a problem.
According to the journalist, Yaw
is the man to talk to if you want a
messages spread in The Maga-
zine. A while ago a politician came
to The Magazine to plead his
cause and was told that Yaw was
the man who could gather people
in the area. In no time the stake-
holders were there to listen to the
politician.
While talking to the journalist and
the apprentices, Yaw appears. He
has been showing his old friend,
also named Yaw, around The
Magazine. All day he has been
running errands and talking to
people, but now he has the time to
tell us his story.
Yaw Peprah was born in 1959 in
Aboase, the town known for its
goldmine. After school he became
an apprentice along with his senior
brother. They learned the trade
in their uncle’s workshop in The
Magazine. At the age of 26, in
November 1985, he decided along
with 17 other Ghanaians to go
to Libya to find work. At that time
41
Libya was known for its wealth and
many Ghanaians went there.
First they went by car to Burkina
Faso, then through Djenné, Gao,
and Timbuktu in Mali. Here there
were no vehicles to be found pass-
ing the dessert to Algeria, so they
had to walk to Libya. After walk-
ing for several days, they reached
the Libyan border at night time. It
was dark and they were met by a
barbed-wire fence. The next day
they were chased by the Libyan
police. They had no papers and
were illegally in the country, so
they were tossed into a car and
driven straight to prison.
Workers playing ludo
In that period Ronald Reagan
was the president of USA, and
the Americans had just bombed
Tripoli. Everybody who looked like
an American was put to prison.
Because Yaw and his friends had
no papers and spoke English,
nobody believed that they were
from Ghana. For 2 months they
were in prison, with ten spoons of
rice a day.
Finally the Ghanaian embassy
had them released and put on an
airplane back to Ghana. Yaw ar-
rived in Kumasi; skinny, and only
carrying what he was wearing in
the Libyan prison.
42
He started working in the goldmine
in his hometown. For 12 years he
was a hard working employee,
who was liked by the head of his
department. When he wrote his
resignation they were not happy
with him because they expected
him to keep working there.
In 1986, his uncle who started the
workshop died, and Yaw’s senior
brother took over.
When the brother suddenly died in
1998, Yaw had to resign from the
goldmine and take over the family
business.
Yaw now lives in his own house
in Biofoyeu near Santase with his
wife and 3 children. At 7.30 am he
leaves the house to drive to work
in his own car. After 30 minutes
he is in The Magazine ready to
the day’s work. He has 11 appren-
tices. The number of apprentices
has reached its limits, because
the amount of work has declined.
The apprentices, he has educated,
have become artisans themselves
and have taken some of his cus-
tomers with them.
The workshop building on the plot
was constructed by his uncle in
1974. When Yaw took over, the
workshop looked different. They
were working on the machinery
inside but because of lack of ven-
tilation he built an open shed and
moved the work outside into the
open air. Before his uncle died, the
owner of the plot promised to let
him keep the workshop on the plot.
Yaw cooperates with the landlord,
and he believes that the workshop
will still be there for many years.
Every month he pays a rent of
50,000 cedis to the landlord. Be-
fore he only paid 20,000, but at a
funeral the owner came to him and
said he needed more money, so he
raised the rent with 30,000 cedis.
The problem in The Magazine
is the spare-part dealers taking
over workshops. The land owner
pushes the artisans off the plots in
order to build storey buildings with
spare-part shops. Then, the work-
shops start operating along the
roadsides; both Offinso Road and
New Site. At the moment Yaw is
the treasurer for zone 5 and says
that GNAG is not doing anything
to encounter this problem. It is not
possible to discuss it within the
association. People will just start
shouting.
“GNAG is not effectively
working, people don’t
pay their dues. Every-
body is looking out for
their own interests.”
Yaw is one of the executives in a
new association called Auto Pro-
fessional Artisans’ Cooperative. It
was founded to acquire some new
land, placed 10 kilometres away in
Cordie. They sent the elders to ne-
gotiate with the chief. He agreed to
give them the land, but it costs 10
billion, which they do not have. An
investment bank has to acquire the
land and sell it to the artisans, who
will pay for the plots over a 10 year
period. The artisans at the moment
do not own the plots on which they
are working. Therefore they are
driven away by the plot owners,
who want to build large concrete
buildings with spare-part shops.
“The children we are
teaching now, they will
definitely get there own
shop. Where are they go-
ing? There is no place”.
The new land will from the begin-
ning be planned only for work-
shops. Spare-part dealers will not
be allowed inside the area; only in
the perimeter of the site.
If the government made laws
concerning the present site for
The Magazine, it might solve the
problem, but Yaw does not believe
it will happen. In the goldmine they
had laws. If you hit somebody or
slept on working hours you would
simply get fired.
“In The Magazine they
do not mind the safety of
the human being.” “No
law – no safety”. “The
goldmine was perfect. If
my brother hadn’t died, I
would still be working in
the mine.”
However, he will not give up the
workshop to work in the goldmine.
It is a family business and he has
been able to build his house in Bio-
foyeu because of the workshop.
When he is not around, there is
a watchman watching the work-
shop and the other buildings in the
area. The watchman used to have
Yaw Peprah’s workshop
some family from the north sleep- Yaw is getting ready to go home
ing under the open shed. They after a day’s work. He changes
would hang up a curtain and sleep his clothes, closes the workshop
behind it, and in the morning when for the day, and drives back to
Yaw came to work they would be Biofoyeu. The apprentices spread
gone. all over Kumasi before they meet
again the next day, hoping that
Yaw starts talking about the new someone will show up with a bro-
technology coming into the car ken manual pump that needs to be
industry. The workshops cannot fixed.
stay in this area and at the same
time implement new technology.
A new site with bigger plots and
ownership of the land has to be
provided. They need education for
repairing the new electronic pumps
coming into the country. Also, they
need new machinery, which they
cannot afford to buy. Nobody in
The Magazine knows how to repair
the new electronic cars. One of
Yaw’s friends was offered the job
to repair a brand new Land Rover
Defender. A small part within the
engine was broken, but because
nobody knew how to repair it, they
replaced the entire engine with an
old second hand engine.
43
Thomas Owusu Ansah
Thomas Owusu Ansah
As many times before, we come to
one of the plots in Area A, where
we are conducting our surveys. We
talk to Tommy the Glass-dealer,
who at the moment is busy. The
plot is filled with cars waiting to
have their windows fixed. Tommy
is running around talking to every-
body and organising the work. All
around him the spare-part dealers
are beginning to close down their
shops, but Tommy is still working.
Actually, we came to talk to his
uncle Samson Frimpong, who
is the owner of the plot, where
Tommy is working. But Samson is
a busy man and not easy to get in
touch with; so now we are waiting
for Tommy to finish his work. The
workshop is getting quieter, and
he is getting ready to close. He
asks if we want to see where he is
living. The family owns two plots
in the area: one is administered by
Samson Frimpong, the other one
is located around 500m down Of-
finso Road towards the city centre
on the opposite side of the road.
44
This plot is larger, and it is here
that Tommy lives with his family.
Coming into the house it is easy
to see from the family’s surprised
looks that they are not used to
having Bronis visiting. However,
the welcome is warm
. 1976 in Offinso, 12 kilometres from
The house is a large two-storey
building. It is almost like a tradition-
al compound house but without the
fourth wing. In the middle a large
3m wide staircase leads up to the
second floor where Tommy has
his room. We are invited inside,
and immediately the television and
stereo are turned on. The room is
divided into two by a curtain. One
side is used as the bedroom and
the other as the living room. We
are placed in the large soft fabric-
sofa listing to the television.
Tommy disappears, and reappears
with two bottles of the local non-al-
coholic Guinness beer, Malta; only
for us, he is not having anything
himself. He places himself in the
sofa opposite us, but because of
the sound level it is not possible to
have a conversation.
We ask him to turn down the vol-
ume in order to get his story right.
Tommy’s full name is Thomas
Owusu Ansah. He was born in
Kumasi. After secondary school
he had some financial problems,
but one of his friends in Accra,
who had a workshop where they
fixed glass, asked him to come
and work there. He did not know
anything about cutting glass but
after two years he had learned the
trade. Back in Kumasi his family
helped him start a workshop on the
plot where it has been the past 5
years.
He has 3 apprentices in his
workshop. Because the workshop
is placed on his uncle’s plot, he
does not, like other people in The
Magazine, have to worry about
being pushed out in favour of
large concrete storey-buildings;
he does not even pay rent for the
workshop. He is doing a good job,
cutting glass, which is why people
come from all over Ghana to have
their glass fixed in his workshop. It
is illegal to drive around in Ghana
with a broken windscreen.
Coming to Kumasi Tommy went to
live with his uncle in the very same
room where we are sitting. After a
few years his uncle found the room
too small and moved back to their
village Offinso. Tommy took over
the room, and today he is living
here with his wife Sarwaah and his
two sons Ebenezer and Abbot. As
we talk about his sons, the eldest
appear behind the curtain. See-
ing the two Bronis in his father’s
sofa makes him run away fast. By
Tommy’s persuasion he reluctantly
returns and sits in the sofa next to
his father.
When Tommy’s uncle left for Of-
finso, he also left Tommy in charge
of the house. Every month he
receives rent from the people living
in the house as well as from the
ones renting the shops in front of
the house. The shop renters pay a
monthly rent from 100,000-150,000
cedis. This money, Tommy collects
and sends to his uncle in Offinso.
Tommy says that he considers
his family house as a part of The
Magazine, and it is a good place
to live. Yet, according to GNAG,
Tommy’s house is on the wrong
side of Offinso Road to be part of
The Magazine. There are no offi-
cial zones on that side of the road.
However, Tommy believes that The
Magazine is changing:
“in the future there will A girl comes into the room and
flings herself on the couch. She is
be more spare-part deal- not part of the family, but is rent-
ers. If you are selling ing a room in the house. Tommy
new spare-parts you will is a fan of the local football team
Kumasi Ashante Kotoko, but he
survive.”
is also very fond of Liverpool; he
cannot really say which team is the
Yet, if you have a workshop you
best.
might not survive unless you are
very specialized. As for his own
When we leave the room we greet
part, he does not worry. No mat-
Tommy’s wife, who is standing
ter how the car industry develops,
outside on the front porch with the
there will always be a need for
children running around her. Out-
people changing windscreens.
side it is getting dark, and all over
Tommy has also started selling
the place the charcoal stoves are
glass instead of just cutting it and
getting ready for tonight’s dinners
repairing it; he actually consider
in the neighbourhood. Tommy fol-
himself as much a spare-part
lows us back to his plot where ev-
dealer as an artisan.
erything is closed. While we have
been talking Tommy’s apprentices
His children’s education is impor-
have closed the workshop, and all
tant to him. In the future he will buy
the spare-part dealers have taken
a chop bar for his wife just across
their articles inside and closed for
the street from where he is work-
the day.
ing; but not as long as the children
are small. When they both are old
enough to go to school, his wife
will be selling food just opposite of
his workshop. This will help to sup-
port the children’s education.
45
Baah-Awuah Atuaene
Baah-Awuah Aiuaene
Offinso road is smelling from boil-
ing stew on this late and humid
Friday afternoon.
In each direction of the roads four
lanes, roars overloaded trucks,
yellow and Bordeaux-red taxis with
biblical quotes written on the rear
windows, next to rattling tro-tro’s
with absurdly high pitched voiced
ticket salesmen, calling out the
names of the various terminuses.
Hectic honking and yet slow mov-
ing, through the heat and smoke of
the engines, we reach Tarkwa and
zone 7 of the The Magazine.
From the junction we continue by
foot down the sloping, still paved,
road until we reach the bend at
“Japan House”. We make a left
and step across the kerb, enter the
gravel road that leads us along the
dark, old, wooden workshops and
the scattered mango trees.
The human flow is mainly moving
up hill, against us.
The masters’ apprentices are
cleaning and organising the tools.
Almost everyone is preparing to
leave to spend the evening alone
or with their families.
A handful of young apprentices are
having a laugh in a battered Volk-
46
swagen, right next to an annex to
their workshop, serving as a place
for prayer to those of the workers
who profess to Islam.
The dynamic diversity of this spe-
cial area is truly astonishing and
fascinating from the first sight. It is
a world of countless veils, hang-
ing like the thick, black clouds of
smoke from fires made of tires,
covering layer upon layer of life as
it is being lived in these surround-
ings.
Next to the open-air gym, by the
wooden cover of a carpenter’s
workshop sits Baah-Awuah Atu-
aene.
Leaned back against the trunk
of the vigorous mango tree, it is
obvious that his doings in these
closing time hours are of a different
character than so many others. He
is not about to leave. He is staying.
He lives here; with his family. This
is their neighbourhood.
We walk with Baah-Awuah to his
house. Accompanied by the sound
of his clicking flip-flops and with his
loose hanging jogging pants, he
himself inspires to a cosy, homey
atmosphere. The impression of
this place as an industrial Mecca
for car repair fades as fast as the
setting sun.
Baah-Awuah’s wife, Akua Aas-
ntewaah, does not speak English
and she is busy with the peeling,
cutting and boiling of yams, as we
arrive. A warm smile and a clinch
of our wrists (her hands being dirty
from the yams) assure us that we
are welcome in her home.
Behind the curtain which we pull
aside, is the entrance to a bar
room. At the moment there are no
visitors and we arrange ourselves
on two out of three wooden bench-
es with a small table between us.
A few commercial beer posters
are decorating the multicoloured
walls, but besides from this, the
room is bare and simple. A second
doorway leads to an open court-
yard and through a cut out hole in
the wall behind Baah-Awuah, you
would place your order for drinks.
Since 1985 this spot has been
run by Akua and, during the last
years, with help from her sister’s
daughter, Abrada Darkowah. The
same year, Baah-Awuah hired a
contractor to start the process of
constructing the present house,
which is separated from the bar by
a small bulging path.
It took years to reach this stage
because the work was done bit by
bit, whenever there was money.
While the establishment of their
new home was slowly proceed-
ing, Baah-Awuah and Akua lived
in a rented house in a nearby
residential area of Tarkwa. By the
time KMA had plans of extending
the busy Offinso Road, the couple
were forced to leave and settle
permanently as neighbours to
Akua’s bar in the The Magazine.
Acquiring land is not easy in Ku-
masi. It was Baah-Awuah’s luck
that he some 10 years earlier had
applied the chief of Tarkwa for a
plot of land in The Magazine’s, at
that time, bush-like area of zone 7.
Without this application he and
Akua would have been left only
with the government’s compensa-
tion of 30,000 Cedis and a hope
that their closest relatives would be
able to offer them shelter.
According to Baah-Awuah, many
families of Tarkwa ended up in this
situation during the KMA’s demoli-
tion process for the extension of
Offinso Road.
The Magazine, with its landscapes
of glistening oily slopes, is not
foreign to Baah-Awuah.
Though he was born and raised
in Nkasigm in the Brahfo region,
140 kilometres from Kumasi, he
started at the age of fourteen, his
journey through the advancement
of the The Magazine educational
system and finished as a mechanic
in 1974.
After using his skills as a mechanic
for a couple of years, Baah-Awuah
left for Nigeria in search of another
job.
Even though Nigeria offered what
he was seeking, it was never
meant to be a permanent destina-
tion, and after 5 years abroad,
Baah-Awuah returned to factory
work in one of Kumasi’s few big
industries.
In the courtyard three cheerful
men have now gathered around
cigarette smoke and eager con-
versation. They are calling it a day
by having a few shots of Akua’s
home-made bitter. Strong liquor
coloured and mellowed with ma-
hogany bark.
In the bar room the third bench
have also been occupied. The
coolness of the late afternoon
tenderly seeps in through every
crack of this wooden structure and
it comforts and relaxes everyone
present with its unspoken predic-
tion of the approaching evening.
Baah-Awuah returns from the
back premises where Abrada had
called out for him. As he stands in
the small, low-ceilinged bar room
again, his good-natured attitude
melts perfectly together with the
spots easy-going atmosphere.
The voices of the surrounding
customers sinks another level or
simply stops as he slips back down
unto the bench, fixes his dark eyes
upon us and continues his story.
1988, Baah-Awuah has left the
factory to earn his money behind
the wheel of one of Kumasi’s thou-
sands of taxis. His brother provid-
ed the vehicle, and Baah-Awuah
himself made sure that the engine
was running steadily.
After a few years, he decides to
turn the yellow taxi-sign off and
change his well known taxi to a
larger vehicle.
He gets a job, which he has kept
ever since, as a driver at a private
bus company, doing long distance
rides from Kumasi to the upper
east regions of Ghana. Twelve
hours of driving each way.
At his present age of fifty-three,
the comfort of the soft driver’s seat
and the less hectic highway traffic
definitely suits him better than the
thought of still being performing
heavy mechanic work.
As being one of the first who set-
tled in this part of The Magazine,
Baah-Awuah does not mind our
request of changing the direction
of our conversation into the subject
of housing in the area.
He has seen how the radical trans-
formation from bush to business
has changed the surroundings of
his family’s home during the past
18 years, and he is aware of the
insecure impasse of their own plot.
At the time when the negotiations
concerning the transfer of the al-
location note from the chief of Tark-
wa to Baah-Awuah fell into place,
Akua and Baah-Awuah were living
together in Tarkwa as a couple.
Because Baah-Awuah did not ori-
gin from this particular area, it was,
from a legal point of view, impossi-
ble for the chief of Tarkwa to hand
over papers on property ownership
directly to him.
For this reason it was Akua, who
was born and raised in Tarkwa,
who stepped in and signed the
agreement and became the actual
owner of the 100x100 ft. plot in
The Magazine, containing both the
established bar and the about-to-
be-finished house.
47
But ownership, in these terms,
does not mean a hundred percent
liberty of action, or the ability to
choose individually what should
happen to your particular demar-
cated site.
There are different kinds of alloca-
tion notes, and the ones which are
distributed by the Tarkwa chief are
not similar to the ones with KMA’s
stamp of approval.
Regardless of several attempts
from Baah-Awuah’s side to make
the KMA face the facts and provide
him with an approved document,
he is consequently being met with
lack of understanding. The plot
which was offered by the Tarkwa
chief, was intended to be used for
residential purposes, but KMA will
not recognize this.
During the government of the Na-
tional Democratic Congress (NDC,
1990-1998) it came to a collision of
interests between the KMA and the
chief of Tarkwa.
“They wanted to put a
road right here along the
boundary”
says Baah-Awuah and points with
a finger straight towards the con-
crete floor below us.
The construction of the road was a
part of a larger strategy intending
permanently and in a more con-
sequent way, to declare the area
of zone 7 as an industrial site and
must prohibit residential buildings.
But the chief is the lawful owner
of the land and though it probably
could have been possible for the
KMA to force their plans through,
the statement of a chief can hardly
be overruled.
In this particular case, the resis-
48
tance from the Tarkwa chief was
strong enough to make the whole
project fall.
The Magazine covers an area of
two hundred hectares and condi-
tions for constructions are not alike
all over the site. By announcing
the decision, concerning the area
east of the Nkradam stream, that
no permanent sandcrete structures
could be erected, the KMA tried
some years ago to keep the devel-
opment of The Magazine under a
more strict control.
Lack of governmental resources
has however, more or less, wa-
tered down this decision and today
the entire Magazine consist of a
wide range of building typologies,
offering all sorts of services and
housing.
When Akua and Baah-Awuah
moved into their present house,
the boundary of the workshop area
and the impassable bush was run-
ning alongside the eastern walls of
their home. By the use of ma-
chetes, the area of the sloping hill
towards the stream was cleared
away and a distance to the bush
had been made.
Not long after the work had been
done, a group of settlers from the
north eastern region of Ghana
looked up Baah-Awuah to apply to
establish their homes on the rough
gravel slope.
Without scepticism and because
Akua felt more secure with some-
one staying close by at times
when her husband was touring the
roads, Baah-Awuah agreed to let
them begin their work of piecing
together little shacks for living.
Over the years relatives to the es-
tablished individuals and families
of the same region, also has joined
in on the land.
“They have never caused
us any trouble”, Baah-
Awuah says, “and as long
as it remains this way,
we welcome their pres-
ence here.”
It is not a relationship of landlord
and tenant, Baah-Awuah has to
his northern neighbours. Once in
a while he receives a little “drink
money” but rent is not part of their
mutual agreement.
When it comes to the few spare-
part dealers and other shops which
are also located at Akua’s plot, the
case is slightly different. A monthly
rent of up to 10000 Cedis is mostly
being collected for the commercial
use of the land, but still no letter of
agreement has ever been signed
by Baah-Awuah, Akua or any of
the shopkeepers.
When Baah-Awuah’s oldest son
finished his apprenticeship in The
Magazine, he decided to extend
his parents house and move in
with his own wife and daughter.
Along the way, three of Baah-
Awuah’s brothers, Akua’s son
Oscar, and Abrada has also found
their way to the house. Every
single room offers space for some-
one to sleep in, even the storage
room and the back premises of the
exact same bar room which we are
gathered in this evening.
In some year’s time, the family
house is supposed to be extended
further. This will affect the people
living on the slope and perhaps
also the spare-part dealers and
shopkeepers. He is continuously
saving money to realise his dream;
a large house almost reaching the
banks of the stream.
Speaking of the stream is the field, which has been kept bare
same as speaking of the dump, for to separate and secure the
and Baah-Awuah believes that nearby houses from the stream
today’s frequency of residential and its tendency to overflow dur-
settlements is the main cause of ing hard rainfalls, indicates that a
the present pollution problems. His football match is taking place in the
prediction is that in twenty years twilight.
time the entire area west of the
stream will be classified as resi-
dential and commercial area and
thus worsening the environmental
conditions.
Bad habits and lack of alternatives
has caused this landscape of scat-
tered cans, plastic containers and
human faeces. The artisans, the
inhabitants and the areas’ house-
hold animals are using the banks
as a toilet.

In 1969, Baah-Awuah recalls

himself fishing and bathing in the
stream, but today the greenish film
that covers the water surface, and
the permanent repulsive stench,
automatically prevents this.
Baah-Awuah obviously wishes for
the environment to be better. His
proposal for a solution is to built
larger concrete gutters and forbid
the dumping of refuse in the future.

“With the water running

more fluently, the waste
would easier be lead to
the connecting streams
of the region, for finally
to be gathered at the Ow-
abi waterworks, north-
west of Kumasi city, he
explains.”

Though the stream is not as at-

tractive as it used to be, the area
surrounding it is still very lively.
The sounds from the plain, dusty
The back premises of the bar

49
Tenii Akapenkum
It is about four o’clock on a week-
day morning and because it is
April, the time for the final exams
is getting closer, and Kofi Akap-
enkum have replaced his sound
sleep with eager studies. In the
light of a single glowing bulb, he
has already been sitting for hours
with his notebook and pen, con-
centrated and disciplined, wrapped
in pitch-black darkness.
This, his third year of upper sec-
ondary school, laps up most of the
light hours of the day.
As the sun starts to rise and
evaporate the thin clouds which
covers Kumasi like a torn grey
blanket, Kofi turns off the light bulb
and prepares for the city, as well
as his family, to awake.
The family naturally shares the
facilities within their home, and
at this time of the day, the small
sandy courtyard which is the con-
necting heart among their separat-
ed, single rooms, is being passed
on to Kofi’s mother, her two little
daughters, Gladys and Esther, and
the fireplace which is hidden inside
a small wooden shelter, in case of
sudden rainsqualls.
Kofi and his two brothers, Thomas
and Francis, who both study at the
50
Tenii Akapenkum
junior secondary level, are leav-
ing early to be in school at seven
o’clock. The world of trade and
repair, which is the foundation of
The Magazine, has awakened and
accompanies them on their way
and it will be there with its deep,
welcoming voice as they return
again in the late afternoon.
The Courtyard
This is how Kofi’s weekdays begin.
Sundays are different. For him and
his brothers there is no school to
attend, and because the artisans
of The Magazine also enjoys to
rest, they leave their workshops
closed and quiet, until the following
morning.
Tenii Akapenkum, Kofi’s mother,
welcomes us as we arrive. She
radiates such care and goodness,
that there is no doubt in our minds,
that she has been waiting and
looking forward to see us on this,
her only day off during the week,
Sunday.
It is past noon and this morning
Tenii and her children have been
attending church in Tarkwa. The
women of the small settlement,
which is separated from the low
watered, thick flowing Nkradam
stream by a twenty meter wide
dusty plateau, are sitting on mats
and stools in front of the first row of
the little, wooden houses.
In the shady covered entrance
room of three of Kofi’s relatives, we
rest on wooden benches. Through
the tiny holes in the varying cover-
ings, the overwhelming white-hot
sky tries to reach us, but the holes
are definitely too small for it to
enter. Only pouring rain will slip
through here, but it truly does not
seem to be approaching. Perhaps
in the evening, the wind will come
blowing and place a yellow filter of
sand from the plateau, across this
little world of Tenii and Kofi and the
rest of their relatives who also live
by the stream.
The inside of the entrance room is
dark. Wooden boards and rusted
sheet metal is the main ingredients
of the construction. Behind a piece
of clothes is the actual sleeping
room of the boys who inhabit the
building. A wall-to-wall bed and a
television-set appear to be what
fills the room.
Electricity is available, but water
needs to be purchased at the
landlords out- door tap or simply
by collecting rainwater.
Tenii sits in the corner where two
benches meet. She is listening
carefully to her second born son
who, because of his English skills
from several years in school, is
helping out with our mutual lan-
guage difficulties.
The two little daughters also man-
age to squeeze in on the benches.
They to want to hear their moth-
ers story of the times when they
themselves were very young or,
in Esther’s case, not even born,
and what the reasons were for the
family to leave their town of origin,
Sandemar, where their oldest
brother, Daniel, is still working with
cultivating land as a farmer.
Tenii starts speaking.
Twenty four hours in north-eastern
direction of Kumasi. That is the
time it takes to reach Sandemar.
The town is the capital of the Up-
per East region and what is more
important to Tenii, is that it is the
capital of the Builsa tribe and the
hometown of her and her relatives.
There are many different tribes, or
groups of people located within the
Upper East region. Besides from
the Builsas, the Frafra tribe, the
Grusis and even the Asantes are
represented there.
The most common way to make it
in Sandemar is by farming. Tenii
and her husband Kojo, though,
were farming like so many others.
They were praying for rain at the
right times, and wished in the end
for a fertile harvest.
This one time of year where they
laid down all their efforts, the
results of the struggle had to come
out well. If not, another long time of
idleness and poverty would be the
reality.
In 1993 the family left town. They
dug their roots free of the familiar
Sandomar soil and packed their
belongings for to head south. The
urge to work was basically their
drive, and in the village of Odu-
masi, 150 kilometres south-west
of Kumasi, they temporarily found
what they were searching for.
Odumasi lies in a forest area,
in which the family established
a house of wooden boards and
branches. It was separated from
the village, but close to the fields,
where the farm work they had
been offered was to be carried out.
For two years they stayed in the
woods, until reports from Tenii’s
stepmother were saying that a
single wooden building in Kumasi’s
Magazine could be theirs. At that
time the stepmother herself was
living in the Magazine, and the
building was one she had pur-
chased, but did not use for the
moment.
Because the city of Kumasi meant
a wider range of work related op-
portunities, the family once again
chose to move.
Since they came to Kumasi,
eleven years ago, his father, Kojo,
have had several different jobs.
At the moment the family hardly
sees him. During daytime he
cooks in the kitchen at the Wesley
Children’s College and when the
pots and pans have been cleaned
and put back in the cupboards he
usually takes the trotro to Ashtown
for to roam the streets at night as a
watchman.
With a family of seven members to
support, three of his sons attend-
ing school, and a monthly rent to
pay, there is no other solution than
to work this much to gather the
necessary amount of money.
Tenii contributes to the household
economy by preparing and selling
porridge. In the early morning she
has a permanent stand where the
side road from Offinso Road flat-
tens out at “Japan House”. Hun-
dreds of workers pass by on their
way to the various workshops. In
the afternoon she walks about in
the eastern part of The Magazine.
Balancing with the large metallic
pot on her head, she is waiting for
customers to buy a portion of the
nutritious porridge.
The promise that a room would be
at the family’s disposition, lasted
for two years time. Fortunately
during this period, a comfortable
relationship to the landlady had
been established, and she freely
suggested that the family put up
their own house.
The plot, on which they were told
to build, is the same as they live
on today. Its steep wavy surface,
from the landlady’s house to the
51
plateau, was obviously a chal-
lenge to construct upon, and Kojo
had to seek assistance within The
Magazine for help to put the floor
in level.
After five years gathered in the
single 10 square meters room and
with a family extension of both
Esther and Gladys, Kofi’s uncle
constructed an additional room,
for Kofi and his brothers. Since
that time the settlement counting
only Kofi’s relatives, has grown
to become an enclave of seven
inhabited buildings, an unused
shack and a shelter for their com-
mon fireplace.
There are 25 houses for living on
the landlady’s entire plot. These
buildings all together house sev-
enty individuals, who have come to
Kumasi like Tenii and Kojo, in hope
The Builsa tribe
52
for better working conditions. The
builsas here are a minority. Most
of the settlers are from the frafra
tribe. They all origin from the same
upper east region and though they
seldom speak with each other,
they have no difficulties with living
this close to one another.
What makes Tenii’s eyes loose a
little of their glow, is the thought of
the enclosing dangers caused by
the industry of the Magazine. She
sometimes fears that the electric
machinery, the tools and the indus-
trial waste, should undeservedly
injure her daughters as they run
around playing. On days like today
though, and on weekdays after
dark, Tenii’s mind is not occupied
with worries like this, and she
enjoys to live with her family on the
slope. None of them feels insecure
during either day or night, and they
have never been victims of any
harassment.
If they should ever get the op-
portunity to move away again, it
would be up to Kojo to decide the
destination. Tenii herself wishes
to stay in Kumasi, and very much
in a sandcrete building. Together
they have plans of trying to save
money for renting a room, but as
long as their children are school-
ing, moving away does not have
the highest priority.
Residential Density

Su
am
e
Ne
w
Ro
ad
d
oa
R
soin
Off

Cemetery
ad

Freeman Centre
Ro
ng
po
am

Cemetery
M

Waterworks

Suame Roundabout

The 1:25000 Division of the total amount of people in the various areas

In order to be able to number the shops at the ground floor and 100 persons each. Altogether the
people living in The Magazine, we accommodation on top. The area areas have a residential density of
have drawn a Residential Density covers 50 ha and according to the 200-300 persons per ha. The area
Map. The Map is based on regis- survey of Area A there is a resi- is 22 ha which means that 5500
trations of the building typologies dential density of 10-100 persons (22x250) persons are living here.
and structures within the different per ha. Altogether 2500 (50x50)
areas. Combined with quantitative persons are living here. Altogether, 12000 persons (460+2
surveys conducted in zone 5 and 500+3450+5500=11910) live within
zone 7, we are able to estimate the While making the survey in zone the entire Magazine on an area
residential density within the differ- 7, we discovered a lot of people covering 187 ha (92 ha+50 ha+23
ent areas of The Magazine. from the northern part of Ghana ha+22 ha). The highest density is
are living along the streams of The along Offinso Road, within zone
Almost the entire New Site, part Magazine. In Area B, more than 60 7 and 2, and along the streams of
of zone 7, and zone 19 consist of people live in shacks. Accumulated The Magazine.
workshops and spare-part deal- along the streams density is 100-
ers. Very few are living in this area 200 persons per ha. These areas The mixed use plots along Offinso
except for the watchmen guarding cover of a total of 23 ha. This Road cover an area of 10 ha and
it. The area covers 92 ha and has means that 3450 (23x150) persons inhabit 2500 (10x250) persons.
a density of 0-10 persons per ha. are living along the streams of The This calculation shows that 21% of
This means that 460 (92x5) people Magazine. the people living in The Magazine
are living within these zones. are living on plots legally parcelled
The plots along Offinso Road out for residential use by the KMA.
In the World Bank area the major- and part of zone 7 and 2 contain
ity of the inhabitants live in sand- large residential buildings inhabit-
crete buildings with spare-part ing between 15 and more than

53
Discussion
In the introduction the concept of
living in a non-residential area like
The Magazine is touched upon.
How does life reveal itself in such
a scenery? Who lives here? What
are the benefits of residing in such
surroundings? What are the conse-
quences? How and why do people
live under these conditions?
Being acquainted with this area
and its inhabitants we find that
people are living in The Magazine
for various reasons and under very
different circumstances. Funda-
mentally the basic need is a place
to sleep. Obvious to everyone it is
preferable if this takes place under
secure and comfortable conditions.
Do people live here out of need,
or are there indications that The
Magazine is in such a state that
people choose to live here?
The 200 ha area holds a large
variety of different income groups,
in addition to this many different
ways of residing can be found in
The Magazine. A small majority
of the residents live in areas laid
out by the KMA as light-industrial,
not planned for housing. The area
holds people who live here out of
need as well as people who have
chosen to live here. There is a vast
difference between rich and poor
clearly seen in the living conditions
and form of housing. We have tried
to understand the various motives
for residing in The Magazine.
Acquiring land in Kumasi is not
easy unless you have some sort
of relation to a local area. In the
northern part of the Old Site the
land is still managed by the Tarkwa
chief. He sells the plots for resi-
54
dential purposes and though KMA
is not approving this, it gives the
plot owner some sort of security of
the land. Many of the poorer resi-
dents in this part of The Magazine
have settled on the land by request
from the individual plot owners.
This makes the area lively and
safe outside working hours. They
appreciate how the area becomes
peaceful after work hours.
Other people move to The Maga-
zine out of desperate need of a
place to live. Those who live along
the streams live on swamped
ground and in areas that becomes
flooded during the rainy season.
The environment along the pol-
luted stream is most certainly not
suited for habitation. Many of the
inhabitants who settled along the
streams are farmers who moved
from poverty in the Northern
regions to seek possibilities of
employment in Kumasi. Others
are immigrants from the neighbor-
ing countries; Mali and Burkina
Faso. Many of them speak French
as the only language apart from
their native tongue and have been
reluctant or difficult to approach in
our research. They live in wooden
temporary buildings similar to the
once found in other unplanned set-
tlements around Kumasi. Many of
these inhabitants have to contend
with poisonous fumes, smoke, and
noise during work hours and live
their entire life surrounded by toxic
refuse and temporarily flooding.
It is obvious that the fundamental
need for a secure and comfortable
place to sleep is not being fulfilled
for those living along the streams.
The circumstances under which
they live are similar to many other
settlements around Kumasi, they
live with insecurity in terms of
flooding and evicting. The insecu-
rity generates a lack of motivation
amongst the residents for upgrad-
ing their living conditions.
Studies of aerial photographs
indicate that it was not until The
Magazine had reached its limita-
tions for expansion, that the land
on the plain was consumed by
Magazine activities. The area
close to the streams can not be
used for workshops because of the
swamped ground and the lack of
infrastructure; one might suspect
that it is because the land can
not be used for workshops the
inhabitants along the streams are
being ignored but it might also be
because GNAG do not have the
authority to move the settlements.
The settlers seem to fear eviction
in case the government becomes
aware of their existents.
Workshops are being pushed out
from The Magazine because busi-
nessmen buy plots and construct
buildings containing spare-part
shops and other commercial activi-
ties more profitable than car-re-
pair. The main problem is that the
artisans do not own their own plots
but are only renting them from
individual plot owners. This has
created a situation where many of
the workshop owners are worried
that prosperous spare-part deal-
ers will acquirer their plots and
turn the place into a non-workshop
area. Many workshops owners fear
being evicted especially because
there is no available land within
The Magazine for settling a new
workshop. Artisans are unwill-
ing to upgrade there enterprises,
which could become a problem
because electronically controlled
cars has caused a growing need
for more modernized and special-
ized workshops. One might fear
that this could destroy the renown
of The Magazine as West Africa’s
largest light-industrial cluster for
car repair. Spare-part dealers de-
pend on the workshops to buy their
items, which means that if all the
workshops are pushed out of The
Magazine, the spare-dealers will
necessarily follow.
One of the consequences of the
many spare-part dealers has been
a new way of living in The Maga-
zine. Especially in the Old Site,
families are living privately on top
of spare-part dealers in mixed use
buildings. These families live on
plots laid out for light-industrial use
and live under the conditions of
the surrounding businesses. The
residents have the advantages that
the area becomes quiet outside
of working hours in addition to the
fact that the area has been up-
graded as a part of a World Bank
project. The tendency of the mixed
use buildings started after the
improved infrastructure.
ous trades taking place around
their home.
We have been in The Magazine
for 2 ½ month and have noticed
advantages as well as disadvan-
tages for living in such a noisy
polluted light-industrial area. In
our search we got adjusted to the
surroundings and what appears
incomprehensive today might ap-
pear customary tomorrow. When
talking about the advantages of
having a mixed light-industrial
and residential areas it becomes
important to take the specific case
in consideration, otherwise the
discussion becomes meaningless.
The Magazine today contains both
functional as well as “dysfunctional
areas” where the light-industrial
activities exist on the expense of
the residents. The term “functional
areas” should be understood as
an area where daily life activities
co-exist side by side with light-in-
dustrial activities. Those who live in
the “functional areas” are typically
those who have means and have
chosen to do so, while those who
live in the “dysfunctional areas”
seem to do so because of lack of
options.
We have been fascinated by the
liveliness of this vibrant and dy-
namic place and impressed by the
unique surroundings as well as the
optimism shown by the inhabitants
in spite of the sometimes miser-
able circumstances.

Our fascination and bewilderment

of The Magazine is not only due
to the fact that there are people
having a daily life in an industrial
area, it is more the scarce bound-
aries that makes daily life activities
blend with the industrial activities.
At times it becomes challenging
to comprehend the livelihood for
those living next to polluting and
noisy workshops. In the southern
part of The Magazine there are
several places were the environ-
mental conditions are maliciously
hideous. People are living in
poisonous waste from households
as well as from the surrounding
industrial activities. The conditions
under which these industrial activi-
ties take place appears so treach-
erous that it becomes challenging
for many of the residents to stay
close to their home without paying
extreme alertness to the danger-

55
Conclusion
Our studies estimate that 12,000
people live in The Suame Maga-
zine today. We have tried to an-
swer the question of how and why
they live here. Our studies suggest
the following answers to these
questions.
People have been living on the
mixed u sed plots from the begin-
ning of The Magazine’s present
location. In the Old Site along Of-
finso Road there have been plots
laid out for mixed-use functions
since 1971. The plots hold large
sandcrete commercial buildings
and residential buildings approved
by the KMA. Some of the people
living in these houses were born
and raised here, this is their family
home. Many of these residents live
as tenants.
along the streams. These people
do not have control over the land
they occupy. The land they live on
is swamped during rainy seasons
and therefore not suitable for
workshops. The majority of these
residents come to Kumasi in order
to find work. Most live in rela-
tively isolated ebclaves where they
can speak there own language
(French, Fra Fra, Builsa etc.).
Housing in The Magazine was not
part of the original plan. Neverthe-
less, this has been developing
since the beginning of the present
location. At the moment people
living in The Magazine has little or
none influence on the area they
inhabit.
From our studies we conclude that
an increased habitation of The
Magazine will take place. The influ-
ence and demands of the inhabit-
ants will affect the present site and
play a significant role for the future
Magazine.

Within The Magazine an increasing

number of larger sandcrete storey
buildings, containing spare-part
shops on the ground floors and ac-
commodation on top, have begun
to overtake the workshops. The
tendency of constructing additional
floor started in the mid-eighties and
due to World Bank funding, the
infrastructure of some areas of The
Magazine have been upgraded to
an extent where people find them
suitable for permanent residing.

Detached family houses, for resi-

dential use only, are also found in
The Magazine. These buildings are
up till 20 years old and are often
still housed by the original owners.
Many of these residents mention
the quietness outside work-hours
as one of the advantages of living
in The Magazine.

People from the northern part of

Ghana live in small shacks mainly

56
Postscript
20 cold soft drinks on the table are
slowly getting warmer. At ITTU’s
classroom, in the heart of The
Magazine, we are waiting for our
guests to arrive to participate in a
discussion concerning the present
and the future Magazine.
We have called this meeting to re-
ceive comments and visions from
the stakeholders, based upon the
results we have come up with dur-
ing the last 2 1/2 months of study.
Governmental authorities, organi-
sational representatives, workshop
masters, spare-part dealers, and
inhabitants are invited, but as min-
utes pass, the pool of condensed
water around the drinks grow
larger, as we are waiting for the
participants.
Half an hour later, our impatience
has turned to contentment. Pres-
ent are Mr. Poku and Mr. Chapman
from the Town and Country plan-
ning Department, Josef Asante
and Baah-Awuah Atauene repre-
senting the inhabitants, Krossman
Hormenoo from the ITTU and Yaw
Prepah as both workshop master
and representative for the garages
organisation GNAG. They listen
to our short presentation of The
Magazine as it appears from our
point of view.
Mr. Poku is used to talking, and
eagerly comments on our results.
“The problems here are
so enormous, I even feel
ashamed to call myself a
planner”,
he says, explaining that the last
time he visited The Magazine was
6 years ago when working on a
plan for New Site, which failed to
be carried out. He seems to have
given up on the present Magazine
because of lack of planning.
“People are not static”,
Poku’s colleague Chapman adds.
He elaborates briefly on the pres-
ent Magazine and its activities
which he does not consider com-
patible with a city like Kumasi at its
I.T.T.U.
present location.
Chapman believes that The
Magazine faces a decentralisation
and his statement that a plan not
necessarily lasts forever, leads to a
discussion of whether The Maga-
zine, or part of it, could be moved
to a new location outside the city.
The security of being an owner or
a tenant on governmental spon-
sored, facilitated land, and com-
mon rules for the workshop owners
and spare-part dealers, is what
Yaw Prepah asks for if he is to be
moved to a new location. He does
not disagree with Mr. Poku that the
present chaotic Magazine makes
it hard to develop better conditions
for the artisans. The businessmen
behind the large scale buildings
57
who threatens the workshops
today, are not sympathetic towards
the artisans.
Krossman Hormenoo has had
enough of the talk. He raises his
voice and confronts Poku with his
point of view: that The Magazine
originally was planned for work-
shop activity and now both spare-
part dealers and accommodation
take up space which could be used
for the educated apprentices to
establish their own workshops.
“Mr. Planner, what are
the outcome of the meeting.
Mr. Poku and Yaw Prepah are
standing on the gallery facing the
courtyard of the ITTU. They are ex-
changing phone numbers, to hold
another meeting.
Krossman is being called to the
room next door. It is Tuesday and
there are other issues on today’s
program.
Our expectations towards today’s
meeting have very much been
fulfilled and we are pleased that
the interest in our studies are so
genuine.
sans were made unemployed. Yet
such a relatively small intervention
from governmental side leads to
physical collisions and commotion
among the workers.
The problems we have been dis-
cussing earlier this afternoon, are
becoming real and put into relief
just outside the window.
Kumi Koduah, secretary of the
GNAG, shakes his head as we the
following day meet him to get the
full version of yesterdays events.

you going to do about “We have no problems

that?”
he says.Mr. Hormenoo is a man
of professional pride and does not
seem satisfied with Mr. Poku’s lack
of response, but this is a meet-
ing where everyone should be
heard which is why we change
the discussion into the subject of
inhabitation.
Baah-Awuah and Josef sit next to
each other by the windows. None
of them express any particular
problems of living in The Maga-
zine. Baah-Awuah explains that he
himself leaves in the morning when
the artisans begin their work, and
returns in the late afternoon as the
workshops close down. Like this
he naturally avoids the nuisance
which the workshops may cause to
the inhabitants.
Josef does not say much because
he is nervous about the situation.
As we bike along the gravel roads
towards Old Tafo, we come upon
here”,
a man whom we have met at the
he says, in a way which does not
GNAG office some weeks ago. He
ask for more questions.
tells us that while we have held our
meeting, a group of artisans have
The roadside appears desolated.
been rioting in the main street run-
Something that used to be here
ning past the GNAG office. The po-
has obviously gone away. Gradu-
lice have been involved and even
ally, The Magazine is changing.
a few people were arrested.
The reason for the riot was a road
upgrading, forcing the mechanics
away from the roadside. No work-
shops were removed and no arti-

The atmosphere in the first-floor

classroom is progressive but yet
friendly. After a couple of hours
and a few conceptual proposals on
the white-board, everybody leaves
with exited minds and happy with Upgrading of the road

58
Notes References
Aerial Photos Light Industry Obeng: Kumasi Suame Maga-
The aerial photos used in this Manufacture of small and light- zine, a background paper, Kwame
rapport are blurred because of the weight articles; manufacture of Nkrumah University of Science &
poor quality of the original photos articles that use moderate amount Technology, Kumasi-Ghana, Sep-
of partially processed materials tember 2002, George Yaw
Banku to produce articles of relatively
Local dish prepared from mashed high value per unit-weight (Web- Adeya: Sources of Training in
maize and casava sters New Millenium Dictionary of African Clusters and Awareness
English) of ICTs: A Study of Kenya and
Blade Runner Ghana, Intech, September 2003,
Science Fiction Film by Ridley Mixed use Catherine Nyaki
Scott, 1982 To hold both residential and com-
mercial functions
Cedi
The local monetary standard (1 Obroni
USD correspond to 9000 cedis in White man in Ashanti language Twi
the year 2006)
Residential buildings
Chief Building used solely for housing
Head of local Royal Family
Sandcrete
Chop bar Ghanaian manufactured building
Place to eat local hot dishes blocks.

Drink money Stool Lands

Monetary gesture Land belonging to the local chief

Fufu Straighter
Local dish made by pounding Artisan who straightens car body
boiled plantains and cassava parts

GNAG Temporary materials

Ghana National Association of Wooden boards, Tarpaulins, cor-
Garages rugated iron sheets, various scraps

Groundrent Town and Country Planning

The local tax on real property
ITTU
The Suame Intermediate Technol-
ogy Transfer Unit, Kwame Nk-
rumahUniversity of Science and
Technology
Kenke
Local dish prepared from ferment-
ed corn dough rolled in dry leafs
KMA
Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly
Department in Kumasi
Governmental planning authorities
Tro-Tro
Public transport, minibus
UTM coordinates
Universal Transverse Mercator
Geographic Coordinate System
Vulcanizing
Hardening materials

59
Programme
The Suame1 Magazine in Kumasi, fruit and water. In parts with high The sloping area west of the
Ghana is one of Africa’s largest concentration of habitation, com- stream and east of Offinso Road
light-industrial clusters. It is an mercial facilities such as hair- is known as the Old Site. The area
area of 200 ha with auto-me- dressers, tailors, and music-stores was planned in 1971 by the Town
chanical workshops discharging appear. Even churches, mosques, and Country Planning Department.
industrial waste in an uncontrolled schools, a fitness gym, a bank, a It is an area of 50 ha consisting
manner. The noise and dust is im- hotel and a health clinic can be of 47 mixed use plots of around
mense. We were told beforehand found within The Magazine. 900 square metres each, and 783
that it was an industrial site only, light-industrial plots varying from
but a walk through the area reveals The Magazine is located close 140 square metres to 1200 square
that people are living here. Clothes to the centre of Kumasi on the metres.
are hanging out to dry, children are sloping area east of the main road
playing, and women are cooking. towards northern Ghana. The This Old Site has received rem-
Our studies estimate that 12,000 Nkradam stream running through edies from a World Bank project in
people live in The Magazine today. the area separates the land of the 1996. The purpose of the project
different chiefs and divides the was to upgrade roads, roadside
The area today is mainly a place area into a New and Old Site. It is drains; street lightning, water sup-
for vehicle repairs and spare-part not possible to cross the stream ply, public toilets as well as dis-
dealers including various artisans, by car but pedestrians can cross posal sites.
welders and vulcanizers. The it several places on small bridges
Magazine is filled with food stalls, constructed of old car body parts The New Site consists of two dif-
kiosks, bars and street vendors and wooden boards. ferent road structures. One is a 20
selling anything from watches to ha area parcelled out as a grid with

Su
am Su
e am
Ne e
w Ne
Ro w
ad Ro
ad
d

New Site
oa

d
oa
oR

oR
ins

ins
Off

Off

Cemetery
Old Site Cemetery

W. B. Site
ad

Freeman Centre
ad
Ro

Freeman Centre
Ro
ng

ng
po

po
am

am
M

Cemetery
M

Cemetery

Waterworks
Waterworks

Suame Roundabout
Suame Roundabout

The 1:25000
The 1:25000

1
The area was initially placed on land belonging to the Suame village

60
funding from the World Bank. It is Building Typologies The commercial wooden shacks
located below the cemetery next and metal containers are 5-15
The residential shacks are wooden
to Mampong Road and consists square metres and either holds
and corrugated iron buildings,
of 208 plots of 500 square metres workshops, spare-part dealers, or
concentrated mostly along the
each. The plots are well demar- other commercial activities as for
streams. The buildings seem
cated and the roads are easily instance kiosks.2
temporary but many of them have
accessible.
been there for years. Some have
In case of workshops, the shacks
concrete floors, but no windows,
The other part of the New Site, are used as storage for tools and
water or sanitation. The shacks are
an area covering 100 ha does other work related articles. The
8-10 square metres and often built
not have demarcated plots and place of work is next to the shack,
in clusters. In each room sleeps
the infrastructure is poor. The and the workshop occupies an
one family or two to three persons.
workshops have stretched into area 10 times as big as the shack
It is often tribes from the northern
the former bush area between the itself. In these workshops 3-10
part of Ghana who resides in these
streams, not following an overall persons work.
shacks. The site where these clus-
plan. A plan from 1997 exists, but
ters are located is swamped during
has never been neither finished The spare-part shacks and con-
rainy seasons and not suitable for
nor implemented due to lack of tainers use the frontage as a dis-
workshops. The land is thus free
funding and because of internal play, which mean that they occupy
and available for housing.
land disputes. Not all workshops an area at least twice their size.
can be accessed by car, and they Because it is only for sale activity
The residential buildings are larger
are often blocked by workshops few (1-5) persons are employed in
permanent constructions built in
expanding their workspace onto these stores. Other commercial ac-
stone and concrete with corrugat-
the roads. Several workshops in tivities carry out their sale or work
ed iron roofs. They can be as big
this area are dealing with large within the shacks such as chop-
as 300 square metres in ground
vehicles and the crossroads have bars and barbering shops. Only
plan and up to three storeys high.
developed according to the turning 1-3 persons work in these places.
Usually, they are houses built 40
circle of big trucks.
years ago on the mixed use plots
The commercial storey buildings
along Offinso Road when the first
There is a lack of draining in are large permanent concrete
plan for The Magazine was made
the New Site. The flat swamped structures with a ground plan of
by the Town and Country Planning
grounds near the streams flood up to 300 square metres. They
Department. Our survey suggests
during heavy rainfall. The me- are one to two storeys high and
that these buildings accommodate
chanics dump toxic chemicals, contain mostly spare-part deal-
15 to 50 persons. The rooms are
oil, as well as human waste and ers or some stores selling items
usually for rent but some hold
refuse into the stream, which is not related to car-repairing. Some
extended families.
a threat to human health. The buildings can hold 16 stores with
roads are eroded and battered altogether 30-40 employees.
Other residential buildings are one-
due to rainfalls and heavy often
storey detached houses built within
overloaded vehicles. Drains have The mixed use storey buildings
the last 25 years by single families.
been constructed in some places, are of the same type as the com-
Usually, they house 10 persons,
but are insufficient. The streets are mercial storey buildings. However,
but in case of additional extensions
filled with large holes and at times instead of two storeys of shops,
up to 60 persons may be accom-
maliciously uneven surfaces. there are shops on the ground
modated in such buildings. Most of
floor and accommodation on the
these buildings are located on the
first floor. Sometimes the owner of
northern part of the old site.
the building lives with his family on
the first floor, and sometimes he
lives elsewhere and the first floor

2
The corrugated iron containers are produced within the magazine and sold in the entire Ashanti region as kiosks

61
is for rent. In the Old Site these The people living in The Magazine There is a growing number of
buildings have water and sanita- make up a small part of the total apprentices eventually becoming
tion. The mixed use buildings are amount of people found in the area masters and there is a growing
situated on light-industrial plots during the day. However, if the demand for land. A suggestion
which is not according to the plan number of inhabitants increases has been made of relocating the
laid out by the KMA .3 The upgrad- they might gain influence within the entire Magazine to a new site out
ing of the infrastructure in 1996 area instead of living on the condi- of Kumasi. The proposal does not
has facilitated the development of tions of a light-industrial zone. consider this option. A new plan for
the mixed use buildings. In The Magazine there seems the present area shall meet further
to emerge a trend of leaving the expansion of both industry and
extended family in favour of the habitation
privacy of the first floor apartments.
Programme In the suburbs of Kumasi this trend How can the workshops, the
can also be found. Nuclear family spare-part dealers, and the inhabit-
One of the problems for the work-
houses with gardens and fences ants coexist within The Magazine?
shops within The Magazine is the
are being built. However, studies
increasing number of permanent
indicate that these houses often The proposal will be based on the
commercial buildings taking up
are occupied by extended fami- present building typologies and
more and more plots. Business-
lies.4 In case of The Magazine, the structures adjusted to the antici-
men buy plots and construct build-
development is different. The first pated development.
ings containing spare-part shops
floor apartments here are often oc-
and other commercial activities
cupied by nuclear families. Being The proposal will take it for granted
more profitable than car-repair. If
close to each other and close to that the immense soil pollution
this development continues the
commercial activity also result in a problems have been taken care of,
workshops might be pushed out
very active space within the neigh- and that the land ownership issue
from The Magazine. The main
bourhood well in line with the spirit is settled leaving KMA in control
problem is that the workshop
of the social Ghanaian way of life. of the area. At the moment differ-
owners do not own their own plots
ent chiefs and plot owners control
but are renting them. Still, the
In Kumasi there is a huge lack of the land. These stakeholders have
spare-part dealers depend on the
housing. The Magazine is a large different interests and are not
workshops to buy their items. If the
area close to the city centre, which working together with a common
workshops are pushed out of The
might suggest further habitation. objective. Because of this it is not
Magazine, the spare-dealers most
When making zone-planning, com- possible for the KMA to elaborate
likely will follow.
mercial, industrial, and residen- a general plan for the area that
tial zones are usually kept apart realistically will be implemented.
In recent years new computer-
causing the commercial and the
ized electronic controlled cars are
industrial zones to be empty dur- The proposal is intended as a
in Ghana. These vehicles require
ing night time and the residential vision for the KMA when plan-
modern machinery and knowl-
zones to be empty during daytime. ning the future area of the present
edge to maintain. This know-how
By combining the various activi- Magazine. The proposal will also
and equipment is not found within
ties into a mixed use zone the full elaborate guidelines under which
The Magazine today. When these
potential of the location of The the development may be facili-
vehicles begin to overtake the
Magazine can be exploited for the tated.
fleet of cars, the workshops will be
benefit of all parts.
forced to upgrade the skills of the
workforce. This might cause large
The main focus of this study is to
modern specialised workshops to
make a written and drawn proposal
arise in the future.
for The Magazine at the present
location in the future.

3
Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly
4
Studies conducted in Gyenyasi, Kumasi by students from The Royal Danish Academy Of Fine Arts, School of Architecture 2006

62
The Magazine 2025
According to the program this pro- Spare-part Dealers roads. The plot sizes are similar
posal operates with the implement- to the present ones along Offinso
ing of more housing facilities in
– Housing Zone Road in order to make it possible
The Magazine. In connection with The organisation of the spare-part to establish the u-shape structures.
the suggestion, a plan of distribu- dealer shops primarily depend on Furthermore we imagine that at
tion of the various work areas as the infrastructure. Today along Of- least 50 percent of the entire build
well as the areas for housing, will finso Road it shows that spare-part area will be constructed for first
be presented. This plan is made dealing is a trade which survives floor habitation. This suggestion
as a dividing of square metres for by being visible and accessible for is made in order to secure the
each of the functions, not taking potential customers passing by. increase of residential buildings.
the number of persons who occupy
open space or work space into Our plan suggests that plots for According to plot sizes and lo-
consideration. spare-part dealing/housing are al- cation on the specific site, the
ways located along the large main
By dividing The Magazine into
4 main zones we will illustrate
how some of the present build-
ing typologies of the area could
remain, and how we, by using
our knowledge of these different
buildings could create new build-
ing typologies evolved according
to the present development of The
Magazine.
The new building typologies will
be structured and organised in a
way to establish a united, efficient
Magazine, both securing the future
of the workshops and the spare-
part dealers as well as caring for
the living conditions for the in-
1:2000
creasing number of inhabitants in
The Magazine.

Our general basis in this sug-

gestion is to use the findings and
experiences we have achieved
during field work. In this way our
solutions will both relate to the
reality which we have described
in our report and lower the costs
of suggested changes by focusing
on what is already present in The
Magazine.

The U-shape 1:500

63
diversity of the united building is
intended to vary and create a ver-
satile street environment.
20% or 38 hectare of the entire
Magazine area is planned as
spare-part - housing area.
Workshops -
Housing Zone
As with the spare-part dealers/
housing zones, the workshops/
housing zones are planned to
consist of both workshop related
buildings and housing facilities.
On these plots we imagine that the
distribution of buildings for work-
shop and housing is similar to the
spare-part/housing zones.
The workshops of The Magazine
- 2025 will be divided into two
main categories; the ones which
are compatible with habitation and
the ones which are not. The plots
planned for workshop/housing
combine workshop activity with ac-
commodation in one building.
Only in very small amounts does
the present Magazine combine the
workshop function with habitation.
Yet this is how we suggest that the
best integration of housing within
The Magazine could be carried
out.
Neither the workshops nor the
apartments need to be located
close to the main roads as long as
the secondary or tertiary roads are
maintained at a certain standard.
Larger areas are therefore suitable
for this combined building typology.
Because Magazine activity in 2025
have changed from physically to
more technologically orientated
work, it is reasonable to suggest
this development. Mechanical
64
work in our part of the world today
move towards less noisy and toxic
working conditions for the artisans.
Because the cars in Ghana are
imported from western or Asian
countries, we believe that the skills
and ways of repairing will follow
the vehicles and influence the me-
chanic industry of The Magazine.
By taking both the workshop and
housing functions into consider-
ation, a beneficial environment for
the artisans and the habitants is
possible to establish.
46% or 88 hectare of the entire
Magazine area is planned as work-
shop - housing area.
Solely Workshops -
Industrial Core Zone
The noise or toxic trades of the
present Magazine will not be gone
in the year 2025. Truck extension
and repair, spraying and straight-
ening of vehicles are still part of
The Magazine, even in the future.
To create reasonable conditions
for both the artisans and the in-
creased amount of inhabitants, we
propose to gather the category of
polluting trades in one particularly
demarcated zone.
We have planned this zone where
the largest amount of these
particular trades is presently be-
ing carried out, and the area will
basically appear as it does today. A
mitigating solution to this industrial
core might be to try to organise the
different artisans within the zone in
a way where the mutual nuisances
is reduced in the best possible
way. The topography and will be
used in the detailed planning of the
zone.
To the west and north, the area
share boundaries with the flooded
area along the streams. To the
south it is demarcated by one of
the main roads of The Magazine
where a buffer of trees along the
road towards the industrial core
could be established. To the east
along New Road, the industrial
core share boundaries with the
back of the spare-part/housing
plots located there.
15% or 29 hectare of the entire
Magazine area is planned for
heavy industry.
Small Scale
Residential Zone
Today a large number of im-
migrants and newcomers from
abroad and northern Ghana live
along the streams of The Maga-
zine. Their housing conditions
separate them from the rest of
The Magazine because the banks
along the stream both serve as
dump for refuse and human waste.
We do not accept these conditions
as suitable for human inhabitation.
By scattering small scale residen-
tial units with plot sizes matching
the needs of the families whom
we have registered in the present
Magazine, we improve the housing
conditions also for the lowest in-
come groups. Small scale residen-
tial units are planned in detached
areas and consist of overall plots
of one hectare divided into small
individual plots of 8x12 metres.
5% or 10 hectare of the entire
Magazine area is planned for small
scale residential units.
The Magazine 2025

65
Infrastructure
We consider the primary roads of
The Magazine to be the ones shar-
ing boundaries with the surround-
ing society; Mampong Road to the
west, New Road to the north and
Offinso Road to the east. Mam-
pong Road and Offinso Road col-
lide at Suame Roundabout south
of The Magazine.
To avoid establishing an infrastruc-
ture which makes The Magazine a
short-cut area, our plan suggests
only secondary and tertiary roads
within the boundaries of these
primary roads. Practically this
makes the internal traffic run slow
and hereby suggesting persons
who has no business to do in The
Magazine, to use the main roads
instead.
Our planning of infrastructure has
its point of departure in the present
conditions for both pedestrians and
motorised vehicles moving around
within the area. By extending and
connecting present roads we have
tied The Magazine together and by
avoiding to add too many new ac-
cess roads from the primary roads,
we have tried to maintain one of
the elements that makes today’s
Magazine’s infrastructure obliging,
the human scale.
Mampong Road
The fact that there presently are
Magazine related activities on both
sides of New Road, and especially
the first 700 - 800 metres com-
ing from Mampong road, makes
New Road an access road to The
Magazine in itself. Besides from
this there are three alternative
possibilities to enter The Magazine
from Mampong Road. One is the
66
present road entering the area - habitation plots and small scale
south of Old Tafo cemetery. We residential units.
suggest extending this road and
connecting it to the infrastructure Another two access roads are
which services the industrial core planned. The first one leads
of The Magazine. The two others behind the spare-part - habitation
are likewise at extended roads on plots along New Road, through
each side of The Freeman Centre an area of workshop – habitation
which is a religious institution, but plots and of small scale residential
these two lead to Old Site where units. This road exits to New Road
one road connects to the infra- shortly after the substation. The
structure of the workshop - habita- other access road is a side road
tion area, and the other runs along dividing the spare-part - habitation
the flooded area of the stream and area and separates the workshop
connects to New Road. - habitation area from the small
scale residential units.
The final access road from New
New Road Road to The Magazine is the same
From New Road we have planned which enters in the south next to
nine access roads to The Maga- the Freeman Centre at Mampong
zine. Coming from the junction Road.
at Mampong Road the first leads
through the area sharing bound-
ary with the north-western side of Offinso Road
Old Tafo cemetery. The road runs
Our plan suggests maintaining
across the culverted stream and
the present infrastructure from
ends up in Old Site.
Offinso Road into The Magazine.
The next two access roads pri-
This means that there is access for
marily service and demarcate the
motorised vehicles eight different
industrial core of The Magazine.
places along Offinso Road. Most
These roads are planned to shape
of these access roads connect
a circle for easier manoeuvring
to the north - south running road
of trucks and other large scale
between New Road and Mampong
vehicles.
Road. The rest of the access roads
One road separates the workshop
connect to the local infrastructure
- habitation area from the heavy
of Old Site.
industry and continues to Old Site,
the other runs in the periphery of
The road network which we have
the industry along the boundaries
laid out is planned to follow the
of the exposed streams. Within the
contour lines of the sloping land-
main circle formation is planned
scape.
several minor roads servicing the
various artisans.
These first three access roads
from New Road to The Magazine
also offer access to the Magazine
area east of New Road which con-
sist of both spare-part/workshops
The Courtyard
The change in building typologies
from today to The Magazine 2025,
is the introduction of the combined
workshop - habitation building. All
other typologies already exist in
some form in the present Maga-
zine, but not in the reorganised
and restructured way that we sug-
gest.

The idea of combining workshop

with habitation evolved from the Housing first floor - shared facilities on each floor 1:500
present development of combining
spare-part dealing with habita-
tion. Because the two trades have
individual needs according to their
businesses, we suggest that the
size and location of the building
on the plot is being decided by the
individual artisan or shopkeeper.
Spare-part dealers might often
need a varying amount of square
metres for displaying their articles
in front of the building, while the
workshops will gather in physically
demarcated garages with less use
of outdoor space. Housing first floor - Private flats with access from the courtyard 1:500

The combined workshop/spare-

part - habitation building offers
three typologies of residential
courtyard environments, depend-
ing on the organisation of the
buildings.

• Passage courtyard
• The first floor/rooftop courtyard
• Private courtyard

The Passage Workspace - Spare-part dealers 1:500 Workspace - Workshops 1.500

Courtyard
The basis for the idea of the
passage courtyard is to develop
a street-like environment in the
space between the buildings
from where the entrances of the
residential parts of the buildings
are located. Contrary to the outer daily life activities.
industrial environment where the To establish this type of court-
workshops and spare-part dealers yard takes two rows of buildings
are located, the environment in the connected across the plots in a
passage courtyard offers space for minimum of 100 metres. A blocking
playing, petty-trading and general building in each end of the”street”

67
makes access for vehicles impos-
sible and by establishing openings
for pedestrians diagonally, a public
passage through the semi-private
courtyard is made. The openings
are placed diagonally to create
alternative accesses through the
area, from street to street and cir-
culation in the flow of people.
The width of the “street” is varying
from 7 - 10 metres. By displacing
the buildings from each other, ki-
osks or stand’s are offered waste-
space from where they can do
their business, and furthermore the
streetscape will appear less strict.
The displacement appears natu-
rally according to the trades car-
ried out on the ground floor level.
A large workshop occupies more
building mass than a small spare-
part shop which on the other hand
requires open space for displaying
the articles. The variation in these
conditions are individual, but the
location of permanent buildings on
the plot will, never-the-less, affect
the space facing the inner court-
yard, and contribute to its physical
appearance.
In our proposal concerning the
passage courtyard, we work with
building depths of 8 and 15 metres
and a common plot size of 25x50
metres.
Because the workshops and
spare-part dealers on the mixed-
use plots are reserved the ground-
floor level for their trading on the
outside of the building, all habita-
tion is placed on the first, second
or third floor. There is a visual
connection to the outside Maga-
zine from the apartments’ galleries
or rooftop terraces, but the physi-
cal connection to the surroundings
always directs towards the inner
“street”.
All habitants are supposed to have
access to both the public passage
courtyard and private galleries, or
rooftop terraces.
68
The Private
Courtyard
The blocking building in the end of
the passage courtyard occurs in
two ways with two different pur-
poses. Both buildings are planned
to end the continuous passage of
the courtyard, but the way they are
placed on the plots, vary from each
other and affects the surroundings
differently.
Both kinds of buildings remain ac-
cessible for the habitants through
the end of the passage courtyard,
which is the area we name the
private courtyard, but because the
first typology is placed lengthwise
the rectangular plot it leaves an
open space around itself, most
likely in connection with a passing
road.
The second typology stretches
across the plot from boundary to
boundary, and blocks for any pas-
sage. It separates the plot into two
and has no backside. Depending
on the building’s depth, the plot
is also here offering lots of open
space.
The first typology’s entrance to the
residential floors is centred in the
building and the environment of
the private courtyard located be-
hind is therefore at the inhabitant’s
disposition. The same situation
occurs where the second typology
is being used. In this case though,
entrance to the residential floors
happen via the staircase at the end
of the house.
By placing a single building on a
plot, compositions which do not
shape demarcated courtyards
occur. This causes a difference
between these plots and the ones
planned for the passage court-
yard or private courtyards where
the combination of two or three
buildings leave a void. A lot of us-
able space is available on these
particular single building plots de-
pending on the size of the building.
The question whether the remain-
ing space should be kept as open
space or used in a way serving
the interest of the artisans, spare-
part dealers or inhabitants is to be
answered by the plot owner.
Because there are three buildings
of 1 to 3 floors of residential area
sharing the courtyard environment
of the private courtyard, there is a
pressure on the facilities. For this
reason we suggest to make an
effort on constructing first floor/
rooftop courtyards particularly in
the blocking buildings. The first
floor/rooftop courtyards serve as
areas where some of the family
doings, traditionally taking place on
the ground level, could be carried
out lifted above street level, closer
to the apartments.
From both east (Offinso Road) and
west (Mampong Road) the topog-
raphy of The Magazine slopes
down towards the stream. Where
we have planned for workshop/
spare-part - habitation buildings,
the sloping ground can be used as
a benefit to the courtyard environ-
ment of the inhabitants. The loca-
tion of the building on the hillside
can reduce the height of the en-
trance to the habitation floors and
make the courtyard appear less
closed and corridor-like.
Access to the courtyard 1:1000
1st floor outdoor space and the advantages of the sloping ground 1:500

The courtyard on different plots 1:2000

69
The courtyard

The courtyard

70
Smale Scale Residential Units
The zone for the low-income group
of the population, who inhabit
The Magazine in 2025, is planned
based on our findings during
fieldwork in today’s Magazine. Our
plan’s main intention concerning
this income group is to relocate
the present habitants away from
the health damaging dump and
the returning risk of flooding along
the stream. Our suggestion takes
into account that The Magazine
might be inhabited by more people
belonging to the low-income group
in the future.
building structure in a natural way.
The decision to choose even sites
for the units evolves from state-
ments from today’s inhabitants
along the stream who expresses
difficulties concerning constructing
on sloping ground with the materi-
als this income group can afford.
The Exposed Part of
the Stream
Contrary to the culverted part of
the stream from the south to the
centre of The Magazine, we sug-
gest to keep the remaining stream
exposed. The inhabitants along
the banks have been removed,
whereupon a natural flooded area
from the central water outlet in The
Magazine to the present one led

By culverting the stream from

where it enters The Magazine in
the south at Mampong Road, to
the end of the grid structure of
New Site - World Bank area, the
stream as a separating element is
removed and New and Old Site is
connected. Furthermore develop-
ment space for both workshop/
spare-part - habitation plots and
small scale residential units are
established on the former riverbed.
Existing settlement 1:500
The units are meant to be scat-
tered “societies” of approximately
one hectare containing approxi-
mately one hundred 8x12 metre
plots. These units are located 8
to 9 places across The Magazine.
The units’ locations are planned to
develop independent environments
and avoid slum clusters. The fact
that the units are integrated among
workshop/spare-part - habitation
plots also reduces the risk of this
development.

In general it is intended to place

the small scale residential units on
land which for instance is planted
with trees and/or which is relatively
even. The trees will form spaces
for assembling among the inhab- Small scale residential units in 2025 1:500

itants while splitting the overall

71

under New Road is planned. The
natural band is given a wideness
stretching from 25 metres east of
the most eastern bending of the
stream to 25 metres west of the
most western bending. Where
there is a marked change in the
contour lines of the landscape, the
buffer-zone of the flooded area is
decreased. This intervention will
eliminate the risk of flooding dur-
ing the rainy season for artisans,
shopkeepers and inhabitants.
Even with this wide green area,
Old and The New Site are still
to be connected with pedestrian
bridges.
14% or 27 hectare of the entire
Magazine area is planned as
flooded area.
72
Income Groups
Through our fieldwork it has been
brought to our attention that pres-
ent Ghanaian lifestyle might be
facing changes. The extended
family’s high degree of sociality
is met with an increasing wish for
more privacy. This is probably a
gap between generations and their
different ideals, and to some ex-
tend we plan The Magazine 2025
to comply with these changes.
The private apartments are the
ones build in the vertical lines of
the underlying foundation of a
workshop or a spare-part dealer.
This building erects as a block,
most likely in two or three storeys.
The main staircase splits up each
floor into individual entrances and
galleries. Here the collectivism of
the traditional compound-house
courtyard gives way to a higher
degree of individual usage of the
space.
The less private apartments on
top of the workshop or spare-part
dealer buildings share all outdoor
areas and facilities of the specific
floor. The corridors and terraces
created by the separated building
masses are common to the habi-
tants, and these areas maintain a
compound-like society among the
people inhabiting the building while
relieving the pressure on the pas-
sage courtyard on ground level.
Our experience is that the pres-
ent private apartments tend to be
equipped with expensive facili-
ties such as ceramic toilets and
sinks, tile floors, and walls together
with kitchen facilities differing
extraordinary from the traditional
shared kitchen of for instance the
compound house. This tendency
suggests that the privacy of these
apartments appeal to high-income
groups who spend vast amounts of
money on the establishment and
creation of their home, and we be-
lieve that this segment is growing
in the future.
Directed towards the middle-in-
come groups are the detached first
floor apartments. Because of the
higher frequency of shared facili-
ties, the rent on these apartments
is meant to be lower. The habitants
of this income group supposedly
would not choose to prioritise the
aesthetics of the apartment as
much as the high-income group,
and the environment of the first
floor detached apartment therefore
resembles the compound house
courtyard in a higher degree than
the environment surrounding the
private apartments.
meeting the wet land

meeting the wet land

meeting the large

scale workshops

meeting the large

scale workshops

small scale housing

small scale housing

73
Transitions
In order to give an impression of
how our proposal could appear
at specific sites, we have chosen
to show three characteristic spots
where different functions meet
each other.
The Workshop -
Housing Zone and
the Flooded Area
In our first example the plot
structure goes from approxi-
mately 25x50 metres on one side
of the road to 25x25 metres on
the other. The reason for this is
the replacement of the courtyard
with the open area of the flooded
area. Where the plot sizes are
decreased there are no possibili-
ties for car access from the flooded
The Housing zone
and the Industrial
Core Zone
Our second example also modifies
the general plan. To avoid close
contact between inhabitants and
the nuisance of the industrial core,
we here waive the rule of building
housing facilities on top of each
workshop and make only single
storey buildings containing work-
shops face the industrial core on
the opposite side of the road. The
second row of workshops though
does contain housing on the first
floor and a courtyard is therefore
still present in the void between
two buildings.
We believe that the future repair
of large vehicles will be carried out
as it is done today, in the open air.
For this reason the buildings which
will characterise the industrial core
mainly will be shacks for tools and
machinery. These buildings do not
offer much screening towards the
road which is why a buffer zone of
parking and plantation between in-
dustry and the dividing public road
should be made. By planting trees,
the noise and dust nuisances from
the industry might also be reduced.
The workshop - hous-
ing zoneand the
small scale residen-
tial area
Because of their size, the small
scale residential units appear
quite different than the rest of the

1:500

area and we have

planned it in this way
to keep the area intact.
There still might be
a request for a buf-
fer zone between the
bush-like flooded area
and the workshop
- habitation plots. We
suggest solving this
problem through the
establishment of back-
yard-like areas con-
sisting of shady trees,
cared for and used by
the inhabitants of the
first floor apartments. Transition between the workshop - housing zone and the flooded 1:2000

74
 1:500
buildings in The Mag-
azine. An aim of our
plan is to give these
units the identity of
a vigorous place. By
demarcating the units
with shady trees, a
soft boundary to-
gether with a recre-
ational public sphere
is created. In this
sphere the opportu-
nity for petty-trading
and other small scale
commercial activity is
also possible.
Scattered within the
units, the plantation
of trees would also Transition between the workshop - housing zone and the industrial core zone 1:2000
serve the purpose of

1:500

creating a common
place; here it would
just be in a private
way directed towards
the inhabitants of the
specific unit.
From the first, second
or third floor of the
surrounding apart-
ments the small scale
residential units will
somehow be cov-
ered by branches
and leaves, and like
that contribute to a
different image of The
Magazine 2025.
Transition between the workshop - housing zoneand the small scale residential area 1:2000

75