Government to settle sanitation debt – President

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has given the assurance that his government would settle debts owed the sanitation service providers to facilitate the evacuation of refuse in the country.

This, he said, would enable service providers to deliver timely and efficient services and fulfil government’s commitment to making Accra the cleanest city in Africa.
    
President Akufo-Addo said this during a media encounter on Tuesday at the Flagstaff House.
    
He said the huge debts owed service providers was hampering their ability to deliver timely and efficient services.

“Therefore the debts would be paid and the evacuation of the refuse would be aggressively pursued,” he said.

The President said provisions had been made to augment sanitation infrastructures in the country.

He said waste transfer stations would be constructed at strategic locations to facilitate rapid collection to final disposal sites.   

This project, he said, would begin in the Greater Accra Metropolitan Assembly and would be extended to other parts of the country.   

Addressing the issue on open defecation, President Akufo-Addo said he was uncertain about the current state of the Accra Sewerage Improvement Project which was aimed at improving and expanding sewerage and sanitation facilities in Accra and its environs.  

He, however, said before any major project took place, there would be community engagements to ascertain their views on such projects since they are the beneficiaries.

He said: “Ghana has a very wide decentralised system hence it’s important to engage the communities whenever beginning any major project”.  

The Presidential encounter was to enable the President to render account of his stewardship for the past six months and harness support for the initiatives he has espoused to change the socio-economic fortunes of Ghana.

Mr Mustapha Hamid, the Minister of Information, said the meeting formed part of the tenets of democracy.

He said it was the responsibility of the Government to interact with the media, as the Fourth Estate of the Realm, to enable them to disseminate information to the public.

Some of the key areas the President touched on were the issues of insecurity, illegal mining, the economy, agriculture, sanitation, infrastructure and education. 

Source: GNA