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On Monday, July 18, 2011, the police and personnel of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly task-force clashed with yam sellers on the Graphic Road in Accra. The task-force went to the area in the morning to stop the yam sellers from plying their trade on the streets, but this resulted in a scuffle. Police officers who were called in to intervene arrested 12 of the yam sellers for allegedly assaulting personnel of the AMA task-force. The traders claim several tubers of their yam were taken away in the raid. Some of the yam sellers in an interview with a radio station in Accra said they tried to beg the AMA officers to return their seized tubers but all to no avail. According to them, the police also failed to listen to their side of the story when they arrived and hastily arrested 12 of their colleagues. But, before or after you listen to their side, this is my side of the story. Until about a decade ago, what our politicians used as a campaign case was the dog chain seller�s story. They claimed they would take all of them from the streets and create more jobs for them. But, just after the campaigns, the dog seller too joined the chain seller on the street for complimentary sales. Then, the dog house seller came with the dog cage and feeding bowl to complete an industry on the street. What I don�t know is where those behind this industry stay in Accra. As for these yam sellers, many of them illegally stay in the Ghanaian replica of the Biblical Sodom and Gomorrah where all the evil activities under the sun are undertaken. The Ministry of Water Resources, Works and Housing, for instance, has always maintained that the delay in the achievement of the set objectives by the Korle Lagoon Ecological Restoration project (KLERP) is due to the activities of these squatters living at the sprawling Sodom and Gomorrah settlement. Even though their stay there has created an ever expanding money wasting hole in government�s resource keeping sack, the state hasn�t been able to evacuate this squalor of them, and continue to pour a lot of money measured in thousands, if not millions, of Euros and American Dollars into the effluvium emanating Korle Lagoon to dig the solid filth these illegal slum dwellers create daily. These squatters know government hasn�t got the gut to show them the exit of the slums. Also they are very much aware of the lackadaisical approach with which both central and local governments have dealt with street hawking and its associated ugly derivatives. Are they not in this country when hawkers are sent off the streets in the central business district of Accra, and are virtually begged to come back later? Perhaps, these AMA guys always come and get them off the streets only to allow them there again during elections�, and their tired of this �going� and �coming� business. Opposition parties enumerate more than thousand and one reasons why government must employ measures with human countenance when getting these people off the streets to allow free passage, among other conveniences. They define, describe, explain and discuss how wicked and heartless government is for taking these day light law breakers from our streets with the ultimate purpose of gaining admirers from that constituency; and, only to come into government to face the same problem. This is what happens when subscribers of democracy reduce this otherwise active development vehicle to mere elections, and, nothing but electoral mathematics. It seems government here are only good at passing laws. One can�t blame those who break the laws more than those whose duty it is to enforce them, because, over here, many a citizen doesn�t know the laws they are supposed to abide by, let alone understand them. Ignorance of the law is no excuse, people often argue, but, the citizens aren�t the state�s �enemies�, hence, it�s wrong to virtually ambush them with �unknown� and �incomprehensible� laws. Governments ought to inform and educate their constituents on the laws and the regulations governing them to promote such laws and facilitate their acceptance and compliance to them. How many Ghanaians know public begging is a crime and why? How many understand why they shouldn�t sell or buy on the streets? Many people here are too ignorant of the law. Recently, a man was seen easing himself on a beach in Accra and when he was questioned by some of the people who had gone there to have fun, he ignorantly argued that he�s rather doing the state some good by reducing the work of the men who carry human excreta from homes into the sea. This man simply doesn�t know, nor understand, why he shouldn�t defecate there. He�s doing us some good, in deed! Moreover, while common sense might tell us the wrongs with our action and inaction, present pressing economic needs make us defiantly object the thoughtful dictates of our conscience, which is why force must be applied instead of searching for undefined human-faced measures to employ. But, more importantly, in the case of the slum dwellers and those selling the tubers and everything on our streets, we need, as a nation, to spread growth in such a manner that people would find less reasons to leave where they are completely to settle in slums in urban areas. And, when they come, the authorities shouldn�t allow them to settle and develop roots in generations before they try to uproot them. After all, merely allowing them to settle should be part of the broad definition of breaking the law against their illegal settlement, hence, those authorities who permit them to squat in authorized places, as in any serious jurisdiction, ought to face the law for implicitly aiding crime through their inaction. We need governments that could go far beyond enacting laws to ensuring their pragmatic enforcement; governments that are prepared to wash and dress these aching socio-economic sores of the nation without fear of being voted out of power for doing the right thing. After all, democracy isn�t just about the next election; it�s about solving problems and meaningful development.