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It is heartwarming to hear that Parliament has approved US$150 million from the World Bank as additional financing for the implementation of solid waste management, drainage improvements, and other flood mitigation measures under the Greater Accra Resilient and Integrated Development (GARID) Project.
It is equally good news that the World Bank is also supporting a broad range of initiatives to mitigate floods and improve solid waste management in the Odaw River Basin.
The project areas captured under the GARID and Odaw Basin initiatives are essential, as they are intended to solve very worrying problems.
Effective solid waste management, good drainage, and other flood-mitigating measures appear to have eluded the country for decades.
Solid waste problems obviously stem from a lack of toilets in homes and public places, which makes some people do open defecation with its attendant health and other problems.
Even where there are good toilets, there are problems regarding where human excreta should be dumped and treated.
Elsewhere, human excreta is used to produce energy, such as domestic gas.
In the case of Ghana, the country appears overwhelmed by the amount of its human waste.
Such waste does not mean only human excreta but also rubbish generated on a daily basis.
Thus, the construction of a waste transfer station and an engineered landfill site must be prioritised.
Definitely, the government cannot shirk its responsibility regarding waste management, and so all stakeholders must give the necessary support for the waste management initiative to succeed.
Now regarding flooding in Accra, we hail the intention to undertake such projects as the repair works on sections of the Odaw Basin, the construction of storm drains in Kaneshie and Nima-Paloma, and the creation of water detention ponds.
The establishment of a flood warning system in the Greater Accra Region is a must.
This is because the region has most of its communities being flood-prone.
But that is not to say other regions of the country are free from flooding.
We, therefore, hope whatever is being done in Greater Accra to mitigate flooding and its devastation will be replicated in the regions to save other citizens.
Everything the government is doing to check flooding is good, but why are flood projects usually done in the rainy season?
We think that must change because they mostly fail to be completed to achieve their objectives.
Besides, some aspects of them are destroyed by the very flood that is targeted to be controlled.
In the end, revaluation is done, and the costs of the projects increase, which is an extra burden on the national budget.
It is the hope of every Ghanaian that the GARID project and related ones will be timely delivered so their objectives will be fully achieved to the benefit of the people.
