Come again, EPA!
There is a disturbing story in the Monday, January 27, 2014 issue of the Daily Graphic in which the Environmental Protection Agency ( EPA) is said to have allowed the siting of a fuel station near the Family Health Hospital in Teshie.
Advertisement
According to the story, the EPA gave the AI Energy Group, “a licensed-oil marketing company with a logistics and support service subsidiary rendering services to clients across the country,” the go-ahead to commit the impropriety in spite of objections from the hospital authorities and the Ministry of Health.
If the story, as it stands, is true, then it puts a big question mark on the integrity of the EPA because we are talking about an action that has the potential to cause “ health hazards, not only to patients and staff of the hospital, but also to in-vitro fertilisation (test tube) babies.”
The excuse by the EPA that the hospital authorities had failed to respond to a request “to outline its environmental concerns” does not in any way exonerate the EPA of wrongdoing because an agency of its calibre ought to be aware of the full consequences of siting a fuel station close to a health facility. Otherwise, what’s the use of the EPA?
By its conduct in the matter, the EPA, it seems, has sought to put economic expediency above moral considerations. It should make more moral sense to consider the health of people before any economic gains. Or what exactly is the point in the AI Energy Group establishing projects that promise to bring “economic benefits” to the people if within the same projects, there are embedded seeds of destruction to the health of the very people the AI seeks to help?
What is the EPA’s interest in all of these? Is the EPA, by its actions, trying to tell the people of Ghana that even though there is proof that the exposure to such a facility as the fuel station could result in health hazards such as “leukemia (blood cancer), Hodgkin’s lymphoma, fetal malformations and premature births,” it is still all right because it says so? Come again, EPA!
Should the AI Energy Group succeed in actually establishing the fuel station so close to the hospital in spite of all the warning signs, it would constitute a serious injustice, not only against the people of Teshie, but also against the good people of this country. It is, consequently, important for the government, NGOs, human rights activists, religious organisations and, indeed, all stakeholders to come together and ensure that this is stopped. The people of Teshie deserve better.
Michael Aryee
Teshie Technical Training Centre
E-mail: micaryee77@gmail.com
