Let’s Own Our Waste – Prof Gordon

Professor Chris Gordon, the Chairman of the Technical Committee on Environment at the Ghana Standards Authority (GSA) has attributed Ghana’s sanitation problem to the domination of the sector by external donations.

In his view, the country would never move forward if it failed to move away from being fed by external donors.

Professor Gordon explained that Ghana is not able to hearness a lot of revenue because the sector depends too much on external aids.

He stated that about 75% of revenue generated by the sector especially by liquid waste was by foreign assistance

Speaking at a lecture in Accra yesterday on the state of the country’s sanitation, Professor Gordon indicated that the entire citizenry was in a state of denial because of the few clean areas visible in our cities.

Prof Gordon said that because some feel unaffected by the filth they do not see it as problem but the issue affects everybody from the high and mighty to the ordinary Ghanaian.

“Everybody is affected by poor sanitation so until we have universal sanitation, we all have a problem, “he said.

Implementation Problem

The ace Environmental Scientist added that ministries linked to sanitation are more interested in the formulation of policies but not its vigorous enforcement.

Prof Gordon also attributed the slow rate of implementation to the lack of collaboration between the relevant government stakeholders like the Sanitation and Water Resources, Finance, Local Government and Rural Development and Health ministries.

“We have got ourselves in a situation where instead of having synergy and moderation, we have a great lock,” he emphasized.

Touching on the establishment of the National Sanitation Authority, he argued that it was prudent, but if the setting up is not followed by hard work, the country would still be faced with the same predicament some years from now.

Way Forward

Prof Gordon suggested that role models be brought on board as sanitation ambassadors to push the sanitation agenda.

According to him, education, research and planning for the sector would go a long way to improve the gains made at the sector.

Also present at the lecture, Local Government Minister, Dr Nana Ato Arthur urged Ghanaians to make the sanitation problem a shared responsibility and not just wait on people in power to solve it.

By: Brenda Osei Karikari