The Central Regional Director of the Ghana Museums and Monuments Board (GMMB), Mr Nicholas Ivor, has as a matter of urgency, called on the Cape Coast and Komenda-Edina-Eguafo-Abrem (KEEA) district assemblies to enforce their byelaws, particularly that on sanitation, to ensure a clean environment around the Elmina and Cape Coast castles.
The regional GMMB director, described tourist attractions as good sources of revenue for the nation, but expressed concern about the attitude of people living near the two facilities, whom he said, defecate and indiscriminately dump rubbish on the beaches making it unconducive for tourism.
Mr Ivor made the call in an interview with the GNA at Cape Coast on Thursday.
He also deplored the way some people loitered about the two castles and tugged after tourists for money and other favours, and said it was imperative for the two assemblies to take steps to stem the situation, since was "soiling the image of the country".
Briefing the GNA on the number of visitors to the castles and revenue accruing, he said 45,876 tourists visited the Cape Coast castle last year against 36,845 in the previous year, while 42,026 visited the Elmina castle last year as against 49,286 the previous year.
Mr Ivor said an amount of 560.6 million cedis was accrued from the visits in 2004, with Elmina collecting 287.5 million cedis and Cape Coast, 272.9 million cedis.
Mr Ivor said within the past 10 years, a total of 988,217 local and foreign tourists had visited the castles.
Of the number, 588,406 visited the Elmina castle whiles 399,811 were at the Cape Coast castle he said.