Mr Pious Akambe, Kassena-Nankana Municipal Environmental Officer has expressed worry about rising cases of Open defecation n the Kassena-Nankana Municipality.
The area records 94 per cent of its population defecating openly in spite of the number of interventions put in place there to improve on the sanitation situation.
“There are currently 18 public toilets existing in the area, which are in good shape, however, patronage has been poor. At least, about 94 per cent of the population engage in open defecate,” he said.
He said recent launch of the 2017 Open Defecation League Table indicated that, the Municipality placed 13th among the 13 Municipal and District Assemblies and scored 5.7 per cent on efforts towards realising defecation free environment.
The table also indicated that only four per cent of water and sanitation facilities existed in the municipality out of estimated eight percent target for all 13 Assemblies in the region, but the Navrongo Municipality has not done enough since the celebration of the 2017 World Toilet Day where the Assemblies pledged to improve on their sanitation status.
The table also placed two other districts, Nabdam and Bolgatanga Municipality at 11th position.
Mr Akambe who spoke in an interview with the Ghana News Agency said the Municipality had started plans to effectively implement Community Led Total Sanitation (CLTs) in the area.
He stated that this was going to be done in partnership with other organisations interested in constructing latrines for households and charged these households to patronise it when it is rolled out, and said about 200 communities making up the municipality would benefit from the programme.
He said the Assembly had engaged communities to sensitise them on effects of open defecation and added that it would soon commence a programme to prosecute landlords who failed to construct toilet facilities in their homes.
He said the District Environmental Sanitation strategic Action Plan (DESAP) introduced in 2008 by the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, only achieved 0.16 per cent of solid waste and 1.7 liquid waste management, which according to him was not encouraging.
He said in 2010 amendments were made to include CLTs to improve sanitation at various District and Municipal Assemblies in the region, adding that in 2012 the Rural Sanitation module was to achieve greater results through facilitating an enabling environment, create demand, strengthen capacity and facilitate supply and monitoring.
He indicated that the municipality had no septic emptier, and said however, that private homes that had toilets relied on private people to empty their liquid waste when due for dislodging. He therefore appealed to the Assembly to acquire the emptier to facilitate the sanitation business.
GNA
