The Chief Executive of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly, Mohammed Nii Adjei Sowah, says the low incidence of cholera outbreaks in the region over the last few years is proof of the progress made in the sanitation sector.
According to him, a lot of interventions instituted since 2016 have resulted in this feat.
He said this while speaking at the launch of the Electoral Areas Sanitation Challenge, which is an initiative aimed at making Accra a liveable city by keeping local assemblies accountable on sanitation issues in their respective electoral areas.
“Today we are confident in saying that Accra for a long time has not recorded a single cholera case and that’s the impact of the interventions that we’ve put in place. Today we have a waste processing plant that is currently processing 400 tonnes of waste daily. We also have the Achimota transfer station which is receiving 1,000 tonnes of waste daily. That takes away the 3,000 tonnes of waste that is debited from the Accra central area. So…about half of the waste is being received by these intermediary facilities in Accra.”
Although the Mayor was quick to admit that improving sanitation in the city was an arduous task, he called on all Ghanaians to take responsibility for the cleanliness of their environment.
“It is a journey that we have started, and we know that at least, by the end of the tenure of the President, we will be assessed by how far we have done as a city. But we are also mindful in telling you that it is a collective responsibility and everyone is supposed to play their part. The waste management outfits play its part by collecting the trash, so it is the responsibility of the citizen not to litter and that’s why you see littering as one of the criteria that we have set out in the assessment of sanitation,” he added.
