26 March 18

 Picture attached

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Social Communal Cleaning

Mr Casely Ato Coleman, Fellow, IMANI Africa Centre for Policy Education, said in many of the clean cities in the advanced world, they do not undertake communal cleaning because the systems work.  He explained that if systems were working there would be no need to organised communal cleaning in the country.

It was attended by representative of civil society organisations in the water, sanitation and hygiene sector, policy makers, waste management companies, metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies, academics, members of the diplomatic community, development partners and donor agencies. Mr Coleman said Ghana also needed strong values driven leaders who would promote a culture of accountability across all three levels of governance that is national, regional and local government to ensure policy alignment in budgeting, planning and measurement of results.

He urged the President of the nation to set clear performance targets for all the key leaders in the sanitation value chain and fire those who do not meet expectations. 

He cited the Local Government Act 462, the Environmental Sanitation Policy of 1999, which was revised in 2000, and 2010, the National Environmental Sanitation Strategy and Action Plan of 2010 and the Strategic Environmental Sanitation Investment Plan (SESIP 2012).

He said sanitation management required joint accountability and responsibility from both citizens as right holders and government as duty bearer to ensure that citizens lived in a safe, clean and healthy environment.  Mr Coleman said sanitation just like security, began with the individual in the same way that they ought to be alert with their personal security.

Mr Franklin Cudjoe, Founding President and Chief Executive Officer, IMANI Africa, said sanitation unlike human rights, had to be worked upon. The presentation was followed by a panel discussion, featuring the Minister of Water Resources and Sanitation, Mr Joseph Kofi Kowe Adda; Mr Mohammed Adjei Sowah, Accra Metropolitan Assembly Chief Executive Officer; Mr Joseph Siaw-Agyapong, the representative of Private Waste Management Companies;  Mr Manasseh Azure Awuni, a journalist.

By Iddi Yire/Emmanuel Kwame Donkor, GNA