The Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA) has announced its resolve to enforce sanitation bye-laws to ensure that the metropolis regains its past glory.
Mr. Samuel Pyne, the Mayor of Kumasi, disclosed this at the 1st Ordinary Meeting of the 3rd Session of the 8th Assembly, held at the Prempeh Assembly Hall last week.
He expressed worry over the practice of littering and indiscriminate dumping of waste by residents, which he described as unfortunate and cost the Assembly huge sums of the taxpayers’ monies, hence the need to take a bold step to curb the development.
As a result, the KMA boss has announced that a Taskforce will be constituted to ensure that the nuisance is corrected and cautioned that the prosecution Section of the Assembly would ensure a swift prosecution of offenders, particularly those in the Central Business District of Adum, to serve as a deterrent to recalcitrant persons.
He also stated that the night cleaning schemes would be reintroduced, as part of efforts to clean the Central Business District and decongest and the Central Business District of loads of waste dumped there by traders.
He noted that to maintain a clean, litter-free and healthy CBD, the decongestion of the CBD is key.
The mayor also announced that the KMA intends to hire additional hands for the Legal Department and give them the needed resources and logistics to aid the department to function efficiently.
He stated that because of non-compliance to legal framework, misappropriation of funds and disrespect of contracts and agreements, the Assembly accumulated a lot of judgment debts over the years and promised to cooperate with the legal leads and other stakeholders to negotiate with their partners on how best the judgment debts can be reduced and make sure that funds are allocated on time and used appropriately.
Mr. Pyne revealed that, the current household toilet coverage, per their records stands at 34% against a target of at least 70% of households and institutions to have decent toilets by the year 2025. This is under the Greater Kumasi Metropolitan Area Sanitation and Water project, a four year programme being implemented by the Government of Ghana through Ministry of Sanitation and Water Resources, aimed at providing household and institutional toilets in pro-poor urban communities to curb open defecation.
According to the mayor, 35 schools have been selected to benefit from the construction of institutional toilets in the Kumasi Metropolis.
He said 200 out of 500 registered household toilets have so far been constructed under the project, while sensitisation is ongoing to get people adequately informed to take advantage of the opportunity to provide toilets for their households.
