A section of the Walls of Vea Dam
As Ghana joined the rest of the world to mark World Water Day, Assembly member for the Vea Electoral Area in the Bongo District of the Upper East Region, Baba Timothy, has called on the Upper East Regional Minister, Rockson Ayine Bukari to call the Contractor working on the Vea Dam to order, lest he or she taste the wrath of the youth.
According to Baba Timothy, the activities of the Contractor are rather polluting the water in the Dam with dust from the gravels and human faeces contained in the soil he is dumping on top of the Dam walls.
“Today is World Water Day, am sure it is to remind people and their governments to keep their water sources safe and clean, so as to get good water to drink. We cannot say same for ourselves. The Contractor is polluting our water and the annoying part is that, he has refused to introduce himself to the community and just doing what he wants. He doesn’t seem to care about the pollution he is causing the water body. Anytime they stir the soil on the walls, the faeces enter the water; unfortunately for us, we don’t get the treated water from Vea, like you guys in Bolgatanga, even though we are living close to the water. My people fetch direct from the Dam and use it. Only God knows if they treat it before using or not.”
Baba Timothy was speaking in an exclusive interview with the Daily Guide, over the state of their water source, as the country marks World Water Day.
Bolgatanga Municipality and its environs are far from the Vea Dam and yet, they rather get treated water from this Dam through the Ghana Water Company, and yet, people living in Vea and other communities in the Bongo district, depend on boreholes, dug-outs and the Vea Dam which they fetch direct for domestic use.
Available information says, the water from most of the boreholes in the Bongo district have high fluoride presence which cause defects on the teeth and bones of the people in the area.
Baba Timothy fears that, if the Contractor is not cautioned to consider the health of the community members in the course of his operations, then there could be a misunderstanding between him and the community, especially when cases of Typhoid start increasing and the people link it to the faeces entering the water.
The Contractor has no Project Sign Post, so no one there knows the Company name, contact number, duration of the contract, Supervising Authority and the scope of work the company is to do on the Dam.
Apart from Vea, many other communities walk long distances to get water from boreholes and dams, unfortunately, many rural people in the region cannot buy treated water in bottles and sachets, as their counterparts in urban centres do.
The theme for this year’s World Water Day is “Water and Waste Water” and meant to get people and their governments to reflect on the need for good water and to avoid wasting water when it is available.
-Ebo Bruce-Quansah
