President John Dramani Mahama has directed the immediate opening and operationalization of six transfer stations that were built more than nine years ago to support the disposal of refuse collected during the national cleanup exercise.
He said this is to prevent the waste from returning into the drains after any rainfall.
The directive follows an appeal from the Minister for Local Government, Chieftaincy and Religious Affairs, Ahmed Ibrahim, for designated dumping points to be made available for waste removed from drainage channels during the post-flood clean-up exercise on July 11.
Speaking on day two of the national cleaning exercise, President Mahama said the move was necessary to address a recurring challenge where waste collected from drains is left by roadsides and later washed back into the drainage systems.
“Yesterday one of the directives I gave was that in the past we do these cleanups, we take all the garbage out of the gutters, but we don’t follow up and come and collect the garbage that is by the roadside.
And so when the rain falls it just washes all the dirt back in. And so today we’re going to concentrate on scooping all that garbage we took out of the gutters into these big trucks that you see there so that they’ll take them to the dump sites and go and dump them.
But we know that if you look at the city and all the garbage we’ve taken out, we cannot do it in one day.
So, we’ll all help to do it today but tomorrow the army and the other agencies will continue until we’re able to clear all the garbage that was taken out of the drains.
We’ve had six transfer stations that were built more than nine years ago. Unfortunately, they were not put into operation. So, we’ve asked the contractor to open the transfer stations, that’s Zoomlion, so that the Aboboyas and others can take the garbage to the transfer stations,” he stated.
The President further directed that tricycle operators who cart the waste should be made to dump them at sites nearby.
“They don’t need to go all the way to Amasama. If they dump at the transfer stations, we’ll use these big trucks and load the garbage and take them to the Arikops. And so all the Aboboyas that are taking part in this exercise, you don’t need to go to Amasama. Go to the nearest transfer station. If you ask they’ll show you where it is and then you can go and dump your garbage there,” he explained.
