President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has today, Thursday, October 22, launched ‘Operation Clean Your Frontage’ stating that “this Campaign is a good step in achieving the vision of making Accra the cleanest city in Africa”.
At the ceremony, he reiterated his pledge to make the capital city, Accra, the cleanest in Africa.
He indicated that over the years, the challenges had to do with logistics, bye-laws enforcement and attitudinal change of the citizenry.
He was hopeful that this campaign would change the mindset of Ghanaians and also help enforce the sanitation bye-laws collectively, with the government, other stakeholders contributing to make Accra, Ghana work again.
President Akufo-Addo commended stakeholders in the sanitation sector, especially the collaborating ministries, political parties as well as the Greater Accra Parliamentary Select Committee and the contribution of Zoomlion Ghana Limited.
Under the auspices of the Let’s Make Accra Work agenda, this initiative is aimed at curtailing the major sanitation problems within Greater Accra.
This will make residents and businesses responsible for the cleaning of their immediate environment and maintaining a clean environment at all times.
This will also be a sustainable complement to the occasional cleansing campaigns to make Accra a cleaner, greener, healthier and more liveable capital city.
The Region Minister Henry Quartey explained that the exercise will train 3,500 youth as a task force under the City Response Team to help polish the agenda of “Operation Clean your Frontage”.
To ensure the effectiveness of the campaign, he hinted that dustbins will be provided from Ayi Menssh down to the Ridge roundabout and other major roads within Accra to ensure that these towns are clean.
He urged residents in the region and all other stakeholders to get involved in the campaign by keeping their frontages and surroundings clean.
In a solidarity message from the Minister for Local Government, Decentralisation and Rural Development, Mr Daniel Botwe, said all the 29 Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) in the region needed to stand up to the task of ensuring cleanliness on their frontages to give the city a new facelift that will be befitting of the national capital.
The minister, therefore, used the opportunity to encourage all residents in the region to abide by the sanitation bye-laws and also get involved in cleaning their immediate facades to make the exercise work.
On his part, the Executive Chairman of Jospong Group of Companies, Dr Joseph Siaw Agyepong, expressed his excitement over the launch of the “Clean Your Frontage” campaign which will make the citizenry responsible for cleaning their surroundings.
He said any initiative aimed at getting a national buy-in for cleaning communities must start from home as it is often said: “Charity begins at home.”
According to him, the company, has since its inception in 2006, embarked on several initiatives to get people to take responsibility for their health and wellbeing through safe and sound environmental practices.
“After all these years, the company has discovered that attitudinal change and enforcement of bye-laws are the two key challenges inhibiting a sustainable clean and healthy environment,” he indicated.
The campaign would make it mandatory for property owners of residential, private and public institutions and the citizenry to clean and green their frontages and all open spaces around their properties.
The various assemblies are expected to create extensive awareness on sanitation and cleaning bye-laws and commit to enforcing the bye-laws, deployment of City Response Team, evacuation of accumulated refuse at sanitary sites and other locations, transfer stations in MMDAs as well as daily sweeping of streets, curbs, walkways, and open spaces among others.
By: Rainbowradioonline.com/Ghana
