Restoration, public value, sustainability of Accra’s Odaws River
Among the eco-assets of Accra city, the seat of Ghana’s presidency,is the Odaws River, once an important basin, now one of the city’s most degraded urban ecosystems.
As Accra continues its visible transformation, the current condition of this river exposes a critical gap in the city’s journey towards resilience and sustainability.
Residents born before 1957, when the city’s population stood around 750,000, can attest to the dramatic changes.
Today, a walk from the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park through Jamestown, the Octagon, 37 Military Hospital to Legon reveals major improvements under the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA).
High-rise buildings, private vehicles, internet access, and teleconnections are daily redefining urban living.
Yet, despite this progress, Accra’s ambition to become Africa’s cleanest and most resilient city remains incomplete. One main reason is the neglect of the Odaws River, which flows through the Nkrumah Circle.
The river is so polluted that its public ecological value is irreversibly lost. Is it possible to restore Odawna?
Odaws river under stress
The Odaws River is severely contaminated, triggering interconnected risks across Accra’s urban systems. Ironically, serious policy debate around the river tends to intensify only after disaster strikes, when floods kill or displace residents.
Previous interventions have failed to deliver lasting ecological outcomes because they relied on narrow hydro-engineering rather than systems thinking. Nature-positive solutions such as precision tree planting were largely ignored.
Apparently, rapid population growth, rising consumption, industrialisation, urbanisation, and climate change have converged to degrade the river basin.
Today, more than 99 per cent of its biodiversity has been lost, posing serious public health risks, including the spread of infectious diseases. This is a crisis issue Ministry of Health would hardly dispute.
Contrary to unpopular claims, the Odaws River is not polluted by “galamsey”.
Instead, it has become an informal landfill for dumping discarded computers, radios, tyres, mobile phones, SIM cards, cigarettes, cassettes and sachet-water rubbers.
Many of the wastes are traceable to multimillion-dollar global brands.
As sediment and solid waste accumulate, the river’s natural flow is disrupted, worsening flooding that exposes nearby communities to severe discomfort, insecurity, and vulnerability.
With annual waste generation conservatively estimated at 2,200 tonnes, fewer than 400 tonnes are properly disposed of.
Waste management alone consumes nearly 70 per cent of internally generated Funds, locking the system into a vicious cycle of environmental problems.
Regreening Accra
At the 2014 Building Effective Cities for Growth colloquium in Accra, jointly organised by the International Growth Centre and the universities of Ghana, Oxford, and London, the distinguished Prof. Ralph Mills-Tettey, then of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences, emphasised the importance of preserving inner-city greens to encourage safe walking, cycling, and healthy lifestyles.
Given the river’s toxic state, many residents believe the Odawna is beyond repair. I disagree. As Ghana’s award-winning scientist, Dr Letitia Eva Obeng, once observed:
“The Mediterranean, until recently, was shocking, but the countries bordering it decided to clean it up.
And, cleaning up can be done; fish once gain breeds in the Thames.
Pollution of surface waters can be stopped, and with determination, suitable technologies can be found.”
History supports this claim.
During my studies in England in the mid-2000s, I personally walked along a visibly cleaner Thames River.
Internally, inspiration exists too. Certain Ghanaian rivers still provide safe drinking water for our rural people.
Even within urban settings, progress is possible.
A comparison of river conditions on the Kumasi-based KNUST campus between 2013 and 2020 demonstrates that river restoration is achievable.
Collectively acting
AMA must re-engage the Environmental Protection Agency, Association of Ghana Industries, Parliament, youth groups, media storytellers, traditional authorities, scientists, and eco-designers through a systems-wide transition strategy.
New reset frameworks should catalyse revision of the urban policies and the Accra Climate Action Plan, aligning them with the UN Agenda 2030 and the Paris Agreement.
Moreover, “citizen will” is equally critical, because success depends on meaningfully shifting from indiscriminate waste disposal.
Truly, rebirthing natural life into the Odawna River is not going to be easy.
The task is big, capital-intensive, and rights-sensitive.
Encouragingly, global and Ghana’s own examples show that restoring the Odaws and similar urban rivers is possible.
With systems rethinking, innovations, and trust-based actions, renewed budgeting can help to rehabilitate, govern, and sustain the Odawna River to strengthen Accra’s position in world urbanism.
The writer is Sustainability Specialist,
GeoSustainability Consulting.
P.O. Box AD 29, Adabraka-Accra.
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