Okyehene calls for severe punishment for those who pollute the environment

Accra, May 5, GNA - Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori Panin, Okyehene, has called for stringent punishment for those who pollute water bodies and the environment.

He said this would serve as a deterrent for others who pollute water bodies, the environment and also inculcate in children the importance of having a clean environment. Speaking at the launch of Cleaner and Healthier Communities (OCHC) initiated by the management of Cleaner Communities Network (CCN), a sanitation oriented NGO on Wednesday, Okyehene condemned developments on waterways.

He bemoaned instances where about 35 per cent of households in Accra did not have toilet facilities and called on government to institute measures to ensure landlords who failed to provide such facilities were punished.

"Due to lack of toilet facilities in some homes, the beaches have been turned into places of convenience", he said. Mr. Joe Boateng, Executive Coordinator of CCN, said OCHC was initiated to encourage corporate organisations to adopt specific communities or public places and take up the responsibility to keep them cleaner, healthier and more beautiful. He appealed to corporate bodies to help keep their communities clean by sponsoring activities of CCN. Professor Agyeman Badu Akosah, Board Member of CCN, attributed high rate of typhoid fever and malaria in the country to inability of the citizenry to ensure clean and healthy communities and urged parents to inculcate in their children the need to be health conscious. He called for the provision of detergents for proper hand washing at various public toilets in the country. In a message read on his behalf, Mr. Joseph Yieleh Chireh, Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, attributed high production of waste in the cities to rural urban migration and inability to maintain healthy lifestyles.

"Thus the waste generated has more or less out-stretched the channels available for the metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies," he said. He expressed government's desire to secure funding for the effective management of solid and liquid waste in the country and called on all and sundry to co-operate with government in its quest to keep the environment clean.

Mr. Yieleh Chireh said government intended to allocate 150 million dollars annually to the Ministry to undertake hygienic treatment and disposal of septage and faecal sludge as well as sullage and storm-water management. "Another 50 million dollars would be allocated annually to reinforce hygienic education and enabling elements for improving sanitation promotion", he added.