It's shameful Ghana has still not been able to address flood crisis — Akim Swedru MP

The Member of Parliament for Akim Swedru, Kennedy Nyarko Osei, has described Ghana's continued struggle with annual flooding as shameful.

He says the country has failed to put in place the infrastructure and systems needed to significantly reduce the impact of the disaster.

His comments follow the heavy rains on Monday, June 29, which caused severe flooding in parts of Accra and other communities, claiming lives, destroying property and disrupting economic activities.

The floods displaced more than 38,000 people, claimed 12 lives and left seven others missing across several parts of the country.

In a social media post on Thursday, July 2, the New Patriotic Party lawmaker said it took the Akufo-Addo administration to develop Ghana's first National Flood Mitigation Strategies, arguing that successive governments had failed to adequately tackle the recurring challenge.

"Ghana recorded its first devastating floods in 1959 just two years after the British handed over the country to us. Sixty-seven years later we haven't been able to figure out how we are going to put the necessary infrastructure and systems in place to reduce the impacts of the annual flooding significantly," he wrote.

The legislator acknowledged that flooding is a global challenge and noted that even developed countries experience floods due to climate change and extreme weather conditions.

He, however, argued that the difference is that those countries have invested in permanent solutions, resilient infrastructure and effective systems that minimise the destruction caused by floods.

"Yes, floods are inevitable and they happen even in developed countries because of climate fluctuations, but they have put together permanent solutions, infrastructure and systems to mitigate their impacts. There's nothing more shameful than this, for a country like Ghana still struggling to put together the necessary infrastructure and systems to mitigate the country's annual floods," he stated.