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08.06.2016 Science

NGO calls on MMAs to improve sanitation management

By GNA
NGO calls on MMAs to improve sanitation management
08.06.2016 LISTEN

Accra, June 8, GNA - The Environmental Service Providers Association (ESPA) has called on the metropolitan and municipal assemblies (MMAs) to arrest and prosecute households who have failed to register with a waste management company and without litter bins.

A statement signed by Ms Ama Ofori Antwi, the Executive Secretary of ESPA, and copied to the Ghana News Agency, said some residents continued to dump waste indiscriminately into drains, shrubs and other areas which ended up choking the gutters thereby preventing the free flow of water whenever it rained.

The statement said in 2010 the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) introduced the Fee and Performance Based contract during which they virtually abolished the central container site dumping system.

It said under the new policy all residents were supposed to register with accredited solid waste management companies so as to have their refuse emptied at landfill sites, however some residents, particularly in the middle and low income areas, had failed to register with accredited companies and had consequently resorted to indiscriminate dumping of their refuse.

The statement said the assemblies had a responsibility to enforce their own policy which compelled the households to register and pay approved rates to waste management companies.

'We have a public private partnership' agreement with these assemblies and under that policy, we are responsible for about 70 per cent of the waste collection-registration of households, provision of litter bins, emptying of filled litter bins and haulage of refuse collected from households and other entities to final disposal sites.

'The assemblies whose core mandate is to ensure that the cities and towns remain clean at all times have about 30 per cent of the responsibility, and that includes the provision of final disposal sites (landfills) and enforcement of the sanitation bye-laws.

'We as a private sector cannot enforce the bye-laws of these assemblies and that is why we need them to do it on our behalf so we can effectively carry out our duty of keeping the areas we have been mandated to work clean.

'The flooding situation for some areas could be avoided if the nation paid more attention to the management of solid waste,' the statement said.

GNA

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