Accra's Unsung Hero: The man who cleans gutters and gets paid

In a bid to tackle the issue of flooding and promote cleanliness in Ghana, a private company called Drain Cleaners, with authorization from the Accra Metropolitan Authority has taken it upon themselves to clean and desilt gutters and drains in various vicinities and then charge the owners.

According to the CEO, Edward Zanyoh who spoke to GhanaWeb's Ebenezer Ackah, it is the responsibility of business and homeowners to take care of the gutters and drains in front of their property.

He asserted that, a lot of people are not aware of a local government by-law that states that users of the drains are responsible for its maintenance as well as cleaning the frontage of their homes and offices.

He said "Our thing is, we are organizing the citizenry and the business owners to take care of their responsibility which is the drain in front of their business."

Mr Edaward Zanyoh said that there is a process of communication that is done before his team takes on a drain and gutter cleaning exercise.

Letters are written and a bill of the cost of this cleaning is prepared prior, and then sent to the individual or owner of the business who has not carried out this vital social responsibility.

"We do not just get up and come and do it. We come and make an assessment and then we bring you an information package which has a copy of the by-law, a letter detailing your responsibility as a business owner and what it is going to cost. After we bring the letter, we expect a response and if we do not get, we come and give you a warning letter and after the warning letter, we give you a second warning letter. We will tell you that, if you do not clean the drain, we will clean it and bill you and if you do not pay, we will take you to court. So it is not like we just get up and clean the drain, we make sure people are aware. We communicate with them at least six times."

Mr Zanyoh went ahead to say that the reason why many parts of Accra are easily flooded is because of the poor designs of the drains. Most are constructed without any thought of maintenance.

He called on citizens to take their social responsibility of cleaning their drains and frontage seriously and called on the government to build drains that can be easily cleaned frequently.

See the video below:

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