Ghana Trade Fair Company Limited on Saturday, March 16, demolished the 20,000-seater capacity venue Fantasy Dome owned by the CEO of Fantasy Entertainment Leslie Quaynor.
Detailing the events that led to the demolishing, Mr Quaynor, in an interview with JoyNews, narrated that his lease had ended and the process to relocate the dome to another venue was underway.
“Obviously, this is a huge edifice, it is not something you just pick up and relocate. I have been looking for land, I need about 45 acres of land to move to and I have found a couple of places, especially at the University of Ghana, Legon. We are in the final stages of negotiating the lease, so I requested a 60-day extension from the trade fair,” he said.
However, the management of the Trade Fair did not agree to the extension and insisted on taking back ownership of the land, Mr Quaynor told JoyNews’ Sweety Aborchie.
To prevent the destruction of his property, Mr Quaynor said he sought a writ and an injunction at an Accra High Court to ensure the Trade Fair management put a halt to any demolition exercise, giving him ample time to relocate.
After weeks of failing to serve the writ on the management of Trade Fair, the Fantasy Entertainment CEO said they successfully served them using substituted services, posting the writ on the company premises among others.
But, despite all these efforts and the court injunction, the management of the Trade Fair demolished the Fantasy Dome, he noted.
Mr Quaynor noted that all was set to move the Fantasy Dome to a new location by the end of March because they were in the final stages of negotiations before the incident.
“It’s very sad because there are several ways to do this. Ghana is a country of laws, you cannot destroy anyone’s property without a court order. Forget the fact that there is an injunction, which there is, how do you still do this and use National Security as your protection to do this and that’s what’s sad for me as a Ghaian businessman,” he said.
“In today’s age, you can just break into people’s properties with bulldozers and just destroy properties claiming it is an eviction, does this look like an eviction?” Mr Quaynor quizzed.
He noted that this is a big blow not just to him as a businessman but to the entertainment industry which needs event centres like these to thrive.
The Fantasy Entertainment CEO said that he reported the matter to the La Police who assured him they would investigate.
Mr Quaynor added that he would also pursue the issue in court.
Fantasy Dome since its establishment about five years ago has been one of the go-to venues for huge events including 3Music Awards, mega church events, Adom TV’s Nsromma and many others.
Source: myjoyonline.com
