Afienya Appeals For Toilet And Garbage Bins

School children of the Afienya DA Basic A, B and C schools have appealed to the Ningo-Prampram District Assembly (NIPDA) to provide residents with the waste bins and toilet facilities.

According to the children, due to the lack of toilet facilities and waste bins and skips in the community, residents defecate in the open and dump their refuse anywhere without recourse to its implications.

They made the appeal on Monday during an European Union sponsored National Commission on Civic Education (NCCE) Citizenship Week Celebration on the theme: 'The Environment and You.'

Miss Ramatu Mohammed, a form one student of the Afeinya DA Basic 'A' School, making the appeal, said residents were using a pathway at Jerusalem, a suburb of the Afienya, as a dumping site and place of convenience.

Miss Mohammed added that the act posed a health danger to residents especially the pupils as their path to school went through the garbage dump and sometimes slipped or walked in faeces.

She blamed the practice on the lack of household, and public toilet facilities as well as inadequate waste containers.

The Ghana News Agency learnt that residents had also turned the Detsedor River as the town could boast of only two waste containers situated at Zongo and Boaheshie.

Other pupils also mentioned that residents dumped refuse and toilet into drains whenever it rained leading to blockage and subsequent flooding of the area.

Touching on other bad environmental practices in their localities, they noted that animal grazing in people's farm, tree cutting, bush burning, indiscriminate littering were rampant in the area.

They gave the assurance that they would help plant trees, dump their refuse in the garbage bins and advised their relatives and parents to observe good environmental practices.

Miss Gifty Agyeiwaa Badu, Ningo-Prampram Distric Director for the NCCE, educating the pupils, said the programme was used as a platform to promote a discussion among the youth to imbibe in them good environmental attitudes in them.

Miss Badu reminded them to obey national and local laws on environment and sanitation, as well as protect and safeguard it by desisting from throwing refuse into gutters, stopping open defecation on the beach and other areas.

She also urged them to keep their homes clean, participate in clean-up exercises, and respect and obey their schools' rules on environmental cleanliness, among others.