Tema Newtown to begin sanitation revolution

By Alexander Nyarko Yeboah, GNA    

Tema Oct. 6, GNA – Four groups in Tema Newtown
have come together to begin a sanitation revolution in the town to end decades
of squalor and apathy with attendant health challenges.

The campaign takes the form of continues clean
up exercises to sensitize the citizenry on the need to keep their communities
clean and also to transform Tema Manhean into a healthy community.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) on
Saturday at the Kpledjo Community Center, Tema Manhean, the Chairman of the
Jaase (King makers) in Newtown bemoaned the poor state of sanitation in the
community which, he said, had made it one of the worst in West Africa.

Mr. Joseph Ashitey Larter, who is also the
Tema Newtown Sub-metro Chairman, Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA) said, “We’ve
realized that the way we are handling sanitation in Tema isn’t the best, so we
came together and decided to help solve this huge sanitation problem.”

He said that the revolution was beginning with
a health walk that was aimed at creating awareness of the upcoming campaign
scheduled to commence in two weeks’ time.

He said they had zoned the campaign according
to the electoral areas which meant that the exercise would take place in each
of the electoral areas every two weeks until the situation improves, adding
that “we’re going to do this for as long as it takes till we see that things
are okay.”

He urged the public to take up their
responsibility to clean their environment since they generated the rubbish.

Responding to whether the people of Newtown
would buy the revolution they were initiating, he retorted, “There must be a
change. We can’t live in a situation in which you tell me you can’t change.
Things are changing in the world so if we sensitize people and punish them, it will
stop.”

He added that “we keep saying in Ghana that we
have bye-laws but we don’t use them so the citizenry aren’t taking things
seriously, but this time we’re going to bite.”

The Secretary of the Patriotic Citizens of
Tema, Mr. Aziz Adotey Maclean, hailed the sanitation revolution, calling it one
of the first in Ghana.

He used the occasion to appeal to corporate
institutions and individuals to come to the aid of the revolution to achieve
its target.

Madam Cecilia Mensah, a resident of Tema
Newtown, pleaded with the TMA to ensure that rubbish was collected regularly as
that has also contributed to people dumping refuse anyhow because refuse could
sit for two weeks without being collected.

The groups initiating the sanitation revolution
are the Tema Traditional Council, the Jaase Council, the Patriotic Citizens of
Tema, and the TMA.

GNA

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