A Deputy Minister of Education, Education in-charge of General Education, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum, says one of the sure ways to keep toilet facilities in basic schools clean is for school heads to deliberately educate their pupils on how to use such facilities.
He declared that most pupils are clearly not conversant with how to use these facilities, the reason for which a lot of them are left in very unhygienic conditions in most schools.
Speaking at a National Symposium on the state of Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) in Ghanaian schools, Dr. Adutwum asked the heads of various schools to supervise the maintenance and usage of water closets in their various institutions.
“I’ve built some schools in my constituency and I’ve actually directed the headmaster to do an orientation for the students as to how to use the facility. Some children are coming from homes that have never had WCs before. When they stand on it and it breaks, then we say that there is no maintenance culture in Ghana. Sometimes it’s about whether the kids were oriented as to the best way of using the facility or not,” he said.
He further added that the Ministry and the Ghana Education Service, GES, will soon partake in dialogues with parents to find how best they can contribute to support the schools.
“We are not against stakeholders supporting the schools. The challenge you’ll have is when you put it in a form of a levy and because a parent cannot pay, their children cannot go to school. It diffuses the purpose.”
“You have the facility that you want a child to use but the poor ones who live in that community will not get to go to school to use the facility because they can’t pay. So I think there should be some dialogue [with the parents] to ensure that contribution can come from them without excluding them [the children] from education,” he stated.
On his part, the Deputy Sanitation Minister, Patrick Boamah, stated that the Ministry has fostered a strong collaboration with the Education Ministry to ensure that basic schools have these facilities to promote hygiene.
He revealed that government has shown great commitment to the sector, claiming that over one billion dollars has been invested in the sector within the last three years.
The National Symposium on WASH in schools that took place on Wednesday was attended by personalities relevant to the sanitation sector such as the Coordinator of the Greater Accra Metropolitan Area Sanitation and Water Project, GAMA, George Asiedu and Atta Ahen from World Vision International.
The conference had panel discussion sessions where gaps were identified in the access to improved sanitation and water facilities in schools, and solutions provided to these gaps.