Rastafarian council threatens legal action against the AMA over the demolishing of structures at Mensah Guinea over cholera outbreak

The Rastafarian Council of Ghana is threatening legal action against the Accra Metropolitan Assembly over the demolishing of some structures at Mensah Guinea, near the Art Centre.
Vice President of the Council tells Starr News the Mayor of AMA, Alfred Okoe Vanderpuije is using the demolishing to cover up his inefficiency.
The AMA earlier this month embarked on a demolition exercise at Mensah Guinea an illegal slum community as part of ongoing efforts to combat the outbreak of cholera epidemic in the national capital.
The outbreak has killed about eighty people so far, with the regional capital, Accra, alone, recording more than 12,000 cases.
Ras Aswad Nkrabeah is the Vice President of the Rastafarian Council of Ghana
He further described the recent demolition as inhumane considering the repercussion on the residents.
By Fred Dzakpata

How Germany avoided Cholera

Na who cause am? So we want to die in the heat of this cholera epidemic and probably take solace in blaming the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) for not providing refuse containers?

The AMA Mayor is alive. And like many state actors, he is in fact healthy. Yeah, you are somewhat right to suggest that he doesn’t care. But have you also thought for a second, if those dying of cholera and people around them do also care?

Why won’t we die if we keep blaming, blaming, and by so doing we shirk our own responsibility. Why not, we are expecting the negative result from our own ill actions to be the portion of the one we are pointing one accusing finger at; meanwhile we have directed the remaining fingers towards our direction and they decently discharge weapons of mass destruction at us. So who is receiving more salvos and who should die first?

The death toll is nearing one hundred out of over 10,000 reported cases in 52 districts across seven of the country’s 10 regions, in just three months since the outbreak, I heard on Tuesday, September 2, 2014.

How many times education should go on and adverts run for us to practise simple hygiene at home and in our communities? I guess radios and televisions, of course the newspapers; in fact all media outlets including the new babies – social media network – should halt everything except hammering on good hygiene and proper sanitation practices for one month to sink home some sense into a naughty, scratchy oblongata in our dusty skull.

I was therefore appalled to be greeted by this headline: “Mensah Guinea residents blame cholera epidemic on AMA's failure to provide waste bins”. As captured by myjoyonline.com on Wednesday, September 3, 2014.

Apparently Mensah Guinea is in Ghana. If it had not been because of the well known local name - Mensah – I would have disowned this community. It is located behind the high-flying Arts Centre in Accra – a famous tourist destination in Accra, regrettably though.They had the effrontery to blame the increasing number of cholera-related deaths and illnesses in their vicinity on the failure of city authorities to provide them with waste bins.

Don’t get me wrong. I will be the last person to speak for the AMA! Why??? Fine, that would be when I don’t have anything better doing. I am more concerned about our living comrades putting their house together and in order. Who knows, we will be sitting side by side to cheer one of the Black football groups at any soccer mundial.

Chief don’t be bothered much. As usual of us, I must admit, we know how to waste money well, well. God forbid that we will spend a few cedis on waste bins. Nonetheless, we will pump wads of banknotes to show off in burying the dead. You see? Can you imagine?!!

The myjoyonline.com story further stated: “Their complaints came to light when residents embarked on a rigorous clean-up exercise Wednesday following AMA’s ultimatum for them to clear filth in the area or have their structures demolished by Friday.”

Now you seeee!!! Oga open your eyes. Not too wide lest some stubborn Mensah Guinea housefly dumps cholera infested element through your squint eyes.

Come to think of it. They were capable of cleaning their surroundings at their own cost, and yet would wait for a marching order from the same lackadaisical AMA, while they die one after the other. What a Kalybosical waoooow!!!

Sometime this year, I hang on a trotro front with a certain obnoxious man. And instead of praying that the swaying commercial vehicle takes us to our destinations safely, we engaged in a seriously needless argument.

Residents around Lapaz pedestrian footbridge on the George Walker Bush Highway (N1 Highway) had dumped waist-high collections of waste under the bridge. It happened months prior to the cholera outbreak, and I prophesied, not proud though, that the people were only inviting illness to themselves and innocent commuters. Voila! We are all wobbling in cholera infested cities as some precious lives extinct on daily basis.

Annoyingly, this man by my side saw nothing wrong with people gathering refuse from their houses, shops and wherever to be dumped along a prominent road - luckily for him he was thrice huge my size I would have elbowed him ah. He nauseatingly commended the residents for exposing the incompetency of the government. I hope he has not been called to glory to watch and applaud the government being shamed dying of our action.

MY GERMANY EXPERIENCE

Courtesy the defunct International Institute of Journalism (IIJ of Inwent), I was in Germany, Berlin to be precise. More accurately, somewhere Osnabrücker inside Mierendorfplatz. We were instructed to keep our refuse inside whenever the waste container placed at the yard was full. Nobody, including me, dared to overflow the container.

I must concede it doesn’t take days to get the container emptied. However, we were very cautious in generating refuse anytime the container was full, unless you want to sleep with heap of refuse in your room.

Can you imagine the cacophony that would take over the airwaves should such directive be issued anywhere in Ghana?

This, I believe, is one of many little things Germany did to avoid any cholera epidemic.

I doff my hat for residents and authorities in Germany. They worked hand in hand to ensure that their environment was clean and neat everyday. Cholera epidemic would sound like a myth in the ears of persons born few decades ago.

It’s about attitude! People there will not empty solid waste and human excreta into gutters immediately they see the cloud gathering to rain like in Ghana.

It is disgraceful that in the 21st century people will contract and die from Cholera in my country Ghana.

By Isaac Essel

Asantehene calls for national emergency for clean environment

Government has been advised to as a matter of urgency consider declaring a national emergency for a clean environment to bring together traditional rulers , local, health , and education authorities to find practical ways of saving the country from the health hazards as a result of the prevailing insanitary conditions.

Asantehene Otumfour Osei Tutu II made the call when he delivered the keynote address at the 19th Ghana Journalist Association Award on the theme “"using development journalism to discern and defend the national interest’’. in Accra.

The current insanitary condition in the country has triggered an outbreak of cholera in the country which has so far claimed 92 lives from over 10,000 reported cases in just three months.
It has now spread to 52 districts across seven regions of the country, excluding the three northern regions- Northern, Upper East and Upper West.


He lamented over the level at which the country has been engulfed with filth making it a haven for breeding mosquitoes after nearly 60 years of Independence.

“We exude pride in ourselves not just as Ghanaians, but as the torch-bearers of African renaissance. How does that pride square with the mounds of refuge in the heart of our cities?” he questioned.
“What makes this more tragic is that all available evidence points to the fact that our forefathers and mothers lived in a cleaner environment than we are he emphasized adding that While creative nations turn their refuse into wealth, we prefer to let our people die from the refuse.


According to him the education and social advancement being enjoyed currently should not make us on our sense of responsibility for our own health and well-being especially when the continent is battling with the deadly Ebola.
The Asantehene has therefore called on policy makers to take pragmatic measures to address the challenge facing the continent.


By Fred Dzakpata

Pay for sanitation services promptly -MMDAs told

Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies have been urged to promptly pay for services they receive in connection with sanitation and for which they are obliged by law to do.

According to the Coalition of NGOs in Water and Sanitation (CONIWAS), paying readily for what they owed was one sure way of preventing the hills of refuse dotted across the country and which, in a way, have contributed to the outbreak of cholera.

Already, the cholera outbreak has claimed over 45 lives and affected over 6,000 people in Accra alone.

In a statement issued by the coalition in reaction to the outbreak, CONIWAS has listed nine other critical measures that ought to be taken by the government in dealing with the epidemic.

The critical measures outlined by CONIWAS include increasing the number of health personnel and health supplies to affected areas, an aggressive public education and awareness creation of the disease, arousing interest on the need for hands to be washed regularly and the necessity of treating household water before drinking.

According to the coalition, an enforcement of laws that compel homes to have appropriate toilet facilities and the urgent need to provide environmental health officers with the requisite logistical support that will help them to execute their jobs effectively are steps the government must take to ensure proper sanitation practices.

It also urged the government to prioritise investments in sanitation, by establishing modern-day solid and liquid waste treatment in an attempt to stop all forms of open defaecation and the dumping of raw faecal matter into the sea.

Citizens were also advised to change their attitudes with regard to sanitation, adopt good hygiene practices and also be mindful of places where food are sold and eaten in public or the throwing of litter while moving in traffic.

“We cannot continue this way as a people. Urgent measures are required and CONIWAS calls on the government to act promptly. Under the circumstances, more emphasis should be placed on preventive rather than curative measures,” the statement signed by the Executive Secretary of CONIWAS, Mr Benjamin Arthur, said.
By Edmund Asante

Sanitation journalists appalled by cholera deaths in Accra

The Ghana Water and Sanitation Journalists (GWJN), an association of journalists with interest in water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) issues is concerned about the number of deaths linked to the recent outbreak of cholera in Accra alone over the last three weeks.

As many as 40 deaths and over 4000 reported cases of cholera have been reported in Accra alone, according to reports in the media.



As a result, the Health Directorate of the Greater Accra Region has declared this year’s outbreak, an epidemic. “This development is most unfortunate, especially when the World Health Organization (W.H.O)’s report on 2013 indicated that Ghana did not record any cholera related deaths last year,” a statement from GWJN said.

Currently, over 3,700 Ghanaians die every year because of diarrhoea diseases such as cholera, attributable to a lack of access to water, sanitation and hygiene. If the spread of cholera is not controlled this number is likely to rise, it added.



It stated: “These deaths and infections could have been avoided if efficient sanitation services (household toilet facilities and proper disposable facilities for liquid and solid waste) were available in many communities in the country.

“About 86% of Ghana defecate in the open because most people do not have basic toilet facilities in their homes and public latrines are not well maintained. Open defecation exposes human excreta, making it easy for flies to carry the pathogens in the excreta to human beings.”

The GWJN is of the view that marginalised communities must be mobilised to build household latrines to prevent people from defecating in the open. This will significantly reduce the annual encounter with cholera.




The GWJN recognises that the Government has a tall list of needs to meet. “However, we are appealing to the Government to make sanitation a priority by allocating more funds to ensure that our environment is clean and healthy. District Assemblies must be given enough resources to engage communities to understand the causes of these preventable diseases and supplement existing community resources to provide clean water and good sanitation services,” the statement noted.



According to GWJN, the activities of Waste Management companies contracted to keep our cities clean must be monitored to ensure that they efficiently provide the expected services.

“One question we would like to ask is what has become of the waste treatment plant initiated through a Public Private (PPP) Partnership project at Adjei-Kotoku, near Nsawam? Also, what has become of the promises to build similar plants to contain the waste that we generate across the country? We need to find a permanent solution to problems associated with waste management in the country.”





The association commended the Vice President of Ghana, Kwesi Amissah Arthur for his recent efforts at getting the capital city cleared of filth.

“We also urge our colleague media men to provide the public with the requisite information to motivate citizens to adopt safe hygienic practices especially hand washing with soap under running water after using the toilets and before eating. We Journalists also have a role to play in enlightening the public to reduce the spread of the disease.

“The GWJN is therefore calling on all Ghanaians to play their individual roles to ensure that we rid our country from sanitation related diseases,” the none-profit organisation urged.





By Isaac Kaledzi