The Okyehene, Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori Panin, has underscored the need for Ghanaians to respect nature by ensuring that their communities and gutters are clean.
“In the olden days, our mothers would wake up around 4:00 a.m and sweep the compound; there was nothing like dumping of refuse into the gutters. In those days, our gutters were clean and tidy,” he recounted.
He said it was regrettable that Ghanaians had brushed aside these good values and were rather dumping refuse into gutters and polluting water bodies.
These negative attitudes, he said, posed various health risks to the citizenry.
“We can deal with the sanitation problems as a country if we defend and believe in the rule of law, and more importantly, respect the rule of nature in our traditional areas,” he stressed.
Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori Panin was speaking when the Minister of Sanitation and Water Resources, Madam Cecilia Abena Dapaah, paid a courtesy call on him at his palace at Kyebi in the Eastern Region on Monday, May 17, 2021.
The Minister was accompanied by some chief directors from her outfit.
The visit was part of the Minister’s four-day working tour of the Eastern and Ashanti Regions, aimed at assessing the state of water bodies, and also to check on water treatment plants in the two regions.
According to the Okyehene, what worked for “our forefathers and ancestors was that they had enormous respect for God’s creation,” adding that practices such as “farming 200 feet away from water bodies went a long way to protect water bodies”.
He insisted that it was imperative that water bodies in the country were protected at all cost.
“We must, therefore, not sit down and allow our water bodies to be destroyed by the practice of galamsey,” he advised.
The Okyehene, who was very passionate about the need to protect the country’s water bodies, said the lack of jobs should not be used as an excuse by the youth to venture into illegal mining.
While commending the Akufo-Addo administration for its concerted towards the fight against galamsey, he appealed to the government to look for funds to reclaim lands wantonly destroyed by illegal miners.
“The reclamation of these lands can be done by engaging the youth to plant trees on them, which will in itself, be a job opportunity for them,” he said.
Furthermore, the Okyehene added his voice to the calls for the country to be decentralised to bring governance to the doorsteps of the people.
“For example, decentralising the country will help decongest and rid Accra of filth and traffic.”
Decentralising the country will mean that Ministries of Sanitation and Water Resources, Lands and Natural Resources, Local Government and Rural Development, Food and Agriculture among others can be moved to other regions, he explained.
“What business, for instance, are the Ministries of Local Government and Rural Development, Food and Agriculture and Lands and Natural Resources doing in Accra?” he asked.
The Okyehene further said it was important that “we change our attitudes to help support the government to fix the country”.
Earlier, Madam Dapaah explained that the essence of her visit to the region was to look at the conditions of the water treatment plants of the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL), and also assess the state of the water bodies in the region.
She said President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo was committed to improving the lives of Ghanaians.
She was particularly happy about the state of cleanliness of the Kyebi township, and applauded the Okyehene for his efforts in that respect.
After the courtesy call, Mrs. Dapaah and her delegation inspected a GWCL water intake facility in Kyebi, not far away from the Okyehene’s palace, the Bunso Water Treatment Plant and finally, the Osino Water Treatment Plant all in the Eastern Region.
From the Eastern Region, Madam Dapaah will move to the Ashanti Region where she and her delegation will undertake a similar exercise.