The Chief Executive Officer of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA), Nii Adjei Sowah, has said investment in infrastructure is vital in the fight against filth in the Accra Metropolis.
According to him, lack of adequate infrastructure is the main challenge of the Assembly in fighting the chronic sanitation issue in the once clean capital city hence promise to face it head on.
“Investment in infrastructure is the key to fighting sanitation in Accra, and once you invest in it you can then, effectively, organize and direct people to fight the menace”, he said on Onua FM’s morning show “Yen Nsem Pa” when he was outlining strategies in dealing with the thorny sanitation challenges with the Bright Kwesi Asempa on Friday.
He added that the AMA lacks temporal storage facilities in the market centers for the heaps of refuse collected daily before transporting them to the main dumping site, saying that, despite all the challenges, the AMA is not relenting on its efforts in finding the solution to the age-old sanitation phenomenon in Accra.
“We are trying as much as possible to get Compassing Trucks to collect the refuse to their disposal site, but this involves a lot of money, huge investment and if we are able to achieve that, and together with the implementation of the by-laws, Accra and by extension, Ghana will be a clean country”, he stated.
The Accra Mayor, further stated that the AMA has as a matter of a quick-fix, incorporated the services of the Tricycle Motor operators into their pool of waste management service providers to help deal with the menace.
He further added that the Assembly has also employed the services of some Private Sanitation Companies, but the companies seem to be lacking vehicles to collect all the refuse generated in a day to their final dumping site, adding also that the dumping site is very far for the Trucks to return quickly for all the refuse.
Meanwhile, the Mayor, has also warned the public against the indiscriminate dumping of refuse, and that they have begun arresting people who dispose refuse indiscriminately in the city, saying “it is not the responsibility of the AMA to go round collecting refuse, it is the responsibility of the people to collect refuse they generate themselves”.
