Kumasi, Ashanti Region, Ghana, June 10, 2019//-Sanitation across the country is not the best judging from the efforts of successive governments to ensure that the country has a healthy environment.
One thing that is clear is that the government alone cannot keep the country clean; all citizens have role to play in the fight against filth and its attendant partner in havoc wrecking, flooding.
In a recent statement the Sanitation Team of the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA) on touring the metropolis after a heavy downpour said,” It is sad to observe that the down pour and its associate effects have brought about loss of precious lives, clearly some future leaders, teachers, footballers, amongst other great talents we can talk about as a nation.”
According to the Team the major or causative agent of the flooding that occurred within and after the downpour was much to do with the reckless way of disposing waste to choke drainages with plastics and other unwanted materials.
To have a clean environment it appealed to the general public to make sanitation issues a priority, and also become personal sanitation officers within their homes, neighbourhoods, churches and other places.
“Again, we call on the relevant government agencies to as a matter of urgency check all houses or properties in the way of our water bodies. It is the duty of the government and citizenry to join hands so to tackle this menace that continues to bedevil us year in year out”, the Team said, adding that, “Let sanitation issues be your priority.”
It would be recalled that in taking office as KMA Chief Executive, Osei Asibbey Antwi, promised to make the metropolis clean but it seems that in spite of measures put in place by him, the resolve to making the erstwhile Garden City of West Africa clean is slipping through his hands. The fortitude and pledge seem not to be enough to overcome the herculean task before him; the KMA Chief Executive needs the cooperation and good will of all citizens to succeed.
Kumasi is grappling with serious sanitation problems due mainly to the activities of residents who dump refuse indiscriminately thereby choking drains at places like: Kejetia, Alabar, parts of the Central Market and the Adum Central Business District.
Experts say KMA’s challenges like those in cities in many developing countries are mainly due among others to the inability to create proper disposal points, lack of enforcement of sanitation laws, population growth, rural-urban migration, and lack of sanitation technologies.
By Oppong Baah, African Eye Report
