Collins Dauda ends three-day visit to Brong-Ahafo

Alhaji Collins Dauda, the Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, has ended a three-day working visit in the Brong-Ahafo Region.

The Minister was accompanied by Mr Justice Samuel Adjei, Deputy Brong-Ahafo Regional Minister, Mr Clement Bugase, Chief Executive Officer of the Community Water and Sanitation Agency (CWSA) and other senior staff of the CWSA.

Alhaji Dauda inspected works on the construction of small water systems at Babatokuma in Kintampo Municipality, Busunya in Nkoranza North, Kwapong in Asunafo South and Dadiesoaba and Nkasiem in Asutifi North Districts as well as Fetentaa and Nsapor in the Berekum Municipality.

He said he was impressed about work on the projects which, on completion, would increase rural water coverage in the Region.

Alhaji Dauda said the projects were being funded by the French government at the cost of GH¢ 12,000.

He advised the beneficiary communities to help in the supervision of the projects to enable the contractors do quality work.

Interacting with the people of Babatokuma, Alhaji Dauda said the ministry through the CWSA, managers of the project, had spent GH¢1 million in the water system in the area but efforts to get the people water had not been successful.

He said though water had not flowed in all the 22 boreholes drilled in the township, the government would ensure that the people got potable drinking water.

Nana Asau Dramani Kabotor II, Chief of Babatokuma, said the about 15,000 people in the farming community and its environs depended on the Kyenyabo River for domestic use.

He appealed to the minister to go for other alternatives in providing the community with water if getting water from underground was unsuccessful.

At Kwapong, the people complained that water from the system was very hard and appealed to the Ministry to do something about it.

In some of the communities, Alhaji Dauda was upset that some of the completed facilities were faulty and not functioning and asked the contractors to immediately repair them.

Mr Bugase later told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in an interview that 15 communities were benefiting from the small water system projects in the region.

Additionally, he said 650 boreholes and 111 institutional latrines were being constructed in the region under the project.

Mr Divine Dugbartey, Chief Water and Sanitation engineer at the Brong-Ahafo Regional Office of the CWSA, said the water coverage in rural and small town sub-sector in the region had increased from 18 percent in 1994 to 62.5 percent as at August 2014.

He said the increase was as a result of the construction of 42 small town water projects, 3,032 boreholes and 441 hand-dug wells.