VALCO supports flood victims in Central Tongu

Thee Volta Aluminium Company (VALCO) has donated a truckload of food and other relief items to flood victims in the Central Tongu District of the Volta Region.

The items worth GH¢130,000 included 80 bags of rice, 600 bottles of cooking oil, 1,020 bags of water, a consignment of mosquito repellents, 30 boxes of Cerelac (baby food) and 70 packs of toilet rolls.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of VALCO, Daniel Nii Kwartei Titus-Glover, led a team of union and management executive members of the company to present the items to the victims at a safe haven in the district capital, Adidome, last Friday.

He said other flood victims in Ada and Shai Osudoku were also expected to benefit from the donation.

“We are here to empathise with the displaced and not to play any blame game,” he said.

Mr Titus-Glover said the visit was also to enable the VALCO team to see at first-hand, the damage caused by the floods from the spillage of the Akosombo and Kpong dams.

For his part, the Deputy National Director of the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), Seji Saji, thanked VALCO for the gesture, saying it would definitely help to alleviate the plight of the flood victims.

He said it had now been established that 39,333 people had been displaced by the floods which did not claim any life.

Recovering

The Deputy National NADMO Director said the affected communities were now recovering from the disaster.

However, he maintained the people still needed relief items while the grounds were being examined to determine the right time to reopen schools, hospitals and morgues.

“We are also still looking into the possibility of the victims returning to their homes but this will take some time and will depend on the severity of the damage caused to their houses,” Mr Saji added.

He stated that the contamination caused by the floods were massive, as they filled cemeteries and public latrines.

Addressing those issues would also require immense resources, Mr Saji pointed out.

Shuttle buses

In the interim, he said, the Volta River Authority (VRA) had made available shuttle buses in some of the affected communities with noticeable falling water levels, to enable the people to commute without using canoes any longer.

Mr Saji said there were now 26 safe havens holding the displaced, adding that the largest, St Kizito SHS, was holding more than 1,000 displaced people.

In a related development, the Over the Counter Medicine Practitioners Association has donated 400 packs of bottled water to the flood victims in the North Tongu District.