Let’s join city authorities to prevent flooding

The rains are here again. Early heavy rains we may consider if we take the seasons in the country into consideration, but it gives a clear signal as to what to expect this year after a couple of years of erratic rains.

After the two heavy rains recorded in a fortnight, we find on our streets what we have always dreaded as a country, plastic waste; all over, in the drains in every part of the capital.

Although the rains could not cause any severe flooding, compared to previous years, especially the June 3, 2015 flood disaster, the choked drains are a clear indication that the situation may be worse, should it rain for many hours.

It is therefore refreshing to find the city authorities, the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA), for instance, taking some proactive action by dredging most of the water channels, including the infamous Odaw River and the heavily choked Korle Lagoon.

The purpose is to free those channels of silth to allow for the free flow of large volumes of rainwater to prevent the seasonal flooding.

It is also worthy of note that the contractors on the Kwame Nkrumah Overpass have worked fast to free the portions of the Odaw River that they blocked to prevent flooding in the area.

While we see these proactive measures being taken by the city authorities as heartwarming, the Daily Graphic would want to call on the citizenry to behave responsibly by ensuring that they do not dump waste; plastic or any other foreign materials, into the drains.

We should also be each other’s keeper by calling to order, any person or group of individuals who fancy engaging in activities that would have effect on the larger majority in the future.

Time and again, we have been told that plastic waste, in particular, is not biodegradable and, therefore, can easily choke drains to cause serious flooding that can claim lives and destroy property.

The Daily Graphic believes that the heavy floods and the inferno that claimed at least 150 innocent lives last year have not been lost on us. To us and like many others, the disaster was avoidable but for our nature as a people who take things for granted and procrastinate all the time.

What happened during what has been declared in the annals of the country’s dark history as the June 3 Disaster should not be allowed to recur in a country which is almost 60 years old.

While we work collectively to avoid the repeat of such a disaster, the Daily Graphic appeals to the city authorities to consider other water channels and drains within the city as it dredges the major ones in order to free them of filth and prevent flooding.

It is also imperative for the city authorities to deploy city guards to arrest and prosecute people found to be littering the city indiscriminately. For too long, the AMA has reneged on its responsibility of bringing to order, people who violate the bye-laws of the assembly.

Until we begin to punish offenders, we cannot make any meaningful headway towards making our millennium city flood-free.