‘No Ghanaian should drink from a pit’ - Dr Ahlijah pushes for end to water crisis

Executive Director of Meaningful Life International (MLI), Dr Kofi Ahlijah, has called on the government, corporate organisations and all stakeholders to join forces to address the widespread water crisis in Ghana, especially, rural areas.

In a statement released to mark International World Water Day which falls on today, March 22, 2026, Dr Ahlijah asserted that water sufficiency can only be realised if it is treated as a collective goal.

International World Water Day is globally celebrated to raise awareness of the global water crisis and supports the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 6 which aims to ensure water and sanitation for all by 2030.

In response to this initiative, Dr Ahlijah, through the Meaningful Life International (MLI) seeks to support the cause by drilling bore holes for deprived communities.

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He also called for all relevant stakeholders to partner him to help deprived communities achieve the SDG goal 6.

“As the world marks World Water Day 2026 under the theme ‘Water and Gender’ and the campaign slogan ‘Where Water Flows, Equality Grows,’ Meaningful Life International (MLI) is calling for renewed national and global commitment to closing Ghana’s rural water gap, especially for women and girls who bear the greatest burden of water insecurity,” the statement said.

Dr Ahlijah who has drilled over 80 boreholes across 92 rural communities in the past two decades, has called for partnership from the government, corporate bodies and all stakeholders to support the worthy cause.

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He emphasised that access to safe water is not only a public health issue but also a gender equality issue.

He stressed that in many rural communities across Ghana, women and girls spend hours each day walking long distances to fetch water, often from unsafe sources shared with animals or polluted by illegal mining activities.

He is therefore calling for a concerted effort to mitigate the issue that pushes mostly rural folks to access water from unsafe sources.

“No Ghanaian should drink from a pit. This is not just a vision, it is an achievable goal if we act collectively,” he added.

Because women and girls are mostly tasked with fetching water for domestic chores, MLI believes investing in water availability inadvertently translates into investing in women, health, and education.

He added that beyond offering a safe option for communities offering potable water to underserved communities is a sure way to spur national development.

VPO/EB