The Member of Parliament for Wa East Constituency, Dr. Godfred Seidu Jesaw says government must spend a substantial amount of the budgetary allocation towards improving access to potable water supply.
According to him, the move will alleviate the water challenges of citizens especially rural folks.
In his contribution on the floor of Parliament on World Water Day, Dr Jesaw categorically cited his constituency in the Upper West Region as one of the many deprived areas with a myriad of challenges in accessing potable water.
“I wish to add my voice to the fact that we have challenges of access to potable drinking water, challenges of maintenance of existing water systems. We also have challenges of climate change that is affecting dams and water systems as well as their holding capacities for water to be processed.”
“And I, therefore, want to call on government and other related stakeholders to rededicate efforts to put in place arrangements that can recognize this and double effort to making sure that accessibility and maintenance are improved. The government should also ensure the maintenance of the dams in direct response to climate change challenges. This will facilitate the attainment of SDG 6,” he said.
Lamenting the ordeal rural communities go through to access a basic necessity such as water, Dr. Jesaw, a Member of the Food, Agriculture and Cocoa Affairs Committee advocated for specific budgetary allocation and action plans by both central government and local government authorities.
He said “I would like to specifically recognize the challenges that the MP for Atebubu, Sanja Nanja, complained about in his statement, of water accessibility in his constituency. I can relate to that very clearly because a similar paradigm exists in my constituency, Wa East. We should look at what specific budget lines we can create for maintaining existing boreholes, especially in such rural communities”.
“Most budgets and annual actions of MMDAs contain the number of boreholes to be drilled. But we don’t see allocations for maintenance of these boreholes.”
World Water Day is an annual United Nations observance day held on 22nd March to highlight the importance of fresh water.
The day is used to advocate for the sustainable management of freshwater resources.
The theme of each day focuses on topics relevant to Clean Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) which is in line with the targets of Sustainable Development Goal 6.