The Lost Societal Treasury

inherited state of our rivers

Many momentous cities and nations have been well-known by their unique architectural designs and endowed natural resources. However, most of these cities are unknown to many people today. It is unbelievable to picture how an entire city can get lost but the truth is they are lost and lost forever. However there are causes to which a city may get lost which may include war, hunger, and climate change, natural disaster, indiscipline, and worthless usage of resources, individual interest over public interest etc. Today, these cities are only historic cities read by thousands of people around the world. We can speak of “Carthage located in present day Tunisia, Troy now in Turkey, Skara Brae located in main Island of Orkney, Caral located in Supe Valley in Peru, Babylon located in Tigris and Euphrates rivers in Iraq” etc. (Touropia.com October, 2017). Perhaps their stories might seem too far from being told or different from our generation but it is not too far from happening to our society. Well am here to remind ourselves; where we started from and where we have reached as a nation.

From Gold Coast to Ghana was a transition but we cannot fail to remember it literal meaning demonstrating how endowed the land of Ghana is. Among the endowed natural resources are gold, diamond, timber, bauxite, manganese, oil, cocoa, farm lands, etc. Nevertheless, the land was beautified with its natural stream flow of water across the country including; Volta river, black Volta, Pra, Ankobra, Densu, Oti, Tano,Birim, Afram, Ofin, Daka, White Volta, Red Volta, Ayensu, Anum, Nini, Mo, Sene, Sisili, Bia, Pru, Kulpawn, Atakora, Todzie, Tain, Kara, Angonwi, Bonsa, Obosum etc. This is the land we came to meet, and this is the treasury we inherited from our forefathers. This is a treasury since the significance of water bodies on wildlife and human life cannot be quantified in monetary terms. In that, water bodies are habitat for wildlife animals or, and aquatic animals. It also serves as protection for nature reserves, national parks, and forest in the country. Among the numerous uses for mankind are; transportation, trading, fishing and crop farming, settlement etc.

Our forefathers lived to conserve lives and the environment. Laws were made to protect and preserve river bodies. These laws were mostly termed as taboos in society. Among the various taboos were; banned of footwear’s in river bodies, throwing of rubbish into rivers and, the prohibition of tree cutting around river. People were taught to believe that the “gods” would punish anyone who does such act. There were also additional laws which dealt with offenders.

Today that society is lost, and our rivers which are our treasuries are also being lost. Smaller rives in Ghana today have been turned into buildings sites. Rivers which few years ago can be located within our various cities and towns are now exchanged for buildings. Rivers which could have been left out to beautify our cities have been killed with structures. People deliberately fill up Rivers and build upon them with the view of developing a new area for settlement. Most Rivers in our villages have been dried out by illegal cutting of trees around them. Some villages have turned river bodies into refuse dump. Many are using all kinds of chemicals to catch fishes; killing aquatic lives in rivers. They forget or might not know how aquatic lives support river live. Today illegal mining has turned our major rivers into all sorts of colours; one cannot recognise the beauty of our rivers again. Name one river which is not polluted in Ghana and it simply means illegal mining have not reached such an area. Is it for fact that the society has not yet seen the negative result of these illegal mining activities to our rivers? Yes or No. whatever your answer is, there are still individuals within the society who believe illegal mining is a job for the few people who do it to provide for their families. This is an epidemic which started few years ago. We left it none tackled but this is the time to stop all these bad habit in our society.

There is no one who does not suffer from the bad habit of polluting and killing of river bodies in the country. Today we use and drink from pipe borne water. Our pipe borne water is chemically polluted due to the colourful nature of our rivers. This chemically treated water later causes a lot of disease including cancer. We have all witness how small communities are suffering before getting access to portable water for domestic and commercial purposes. We have all been victims when Accra and neighbouring cities got flooded by little rainfall. Our farmers have seen the implication of how dried our farm lands have become. Aren’t this and many serious consequences enough for us as a nation to wake up from our slumber?

What are we looking for as a society; development under the influences of losing our societal treasuries? What are we looking for, individual selfish interest or protection of lives and treasuries for now and the next generation to come? The choice is ours but we cannot run away from the consequences as a nation.

If we don’t help get to the bottom of this, one day what we boast of as a people, will become our source of tears when we sit down and remember the good old days. If we don’t stop killing of river bodies through illegal mining in river bodies, cutting of trees around river bodies, building in river paths and throwing garbage into river streams, a generation will come, read about us and the treasury we inherited and ask the simple question, where is our land, where is our rivers, and where is our treasuries ?

This is a call for us all, opinion leaders, organisations, individuals, government and authorities to come together and fight this social disaster. We are losing our river bodies to our evil doings. Let accept our roles in fighting this canker. Our identity as Ghanaians goes beyond the fact of being born here. We have the duty to protect and preserve the treasury we came to meet. Let us together hold hands in building our mother land by protecting our river bodies. Let be each other’s keeper by exposing the wrong doers in our society. Let start the education from various homes, schoools, organisations, platforms and help uphold various government policies and plans towards eradicating this problem.

Water is life, Preserve Rivers today and save life.

Ishmael Arhin
Dokuz Eylul University
Izmir - Turkey