The national rural water coverage which stood at 51.86 per cent in 201 has now invested to 63.34 per cent. With this, Ghana is on the path of achieving the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) target of 76 per cent of rural water coverage by 2015 and the universal coverage of extending water supply to every community in 2025.

The Chief Executive of CWSA, Mr Clement Bugase, announced this at the opening ceremony of the 2011 annual review conference of the agency at Ejisu in the Ashanti Region.

The one week conference brought participants from all the 10 regions, CWSA board of directors and other stakeholders from the Ministry of Water Resources, Works and Housing, Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, Regional Co-ordinating Council and District Assemblies.

The theme of the conference was “Tracking functionality of wash facilities-a key to sustainable services.” It allowed the CWSA and its major stakeholders to assess its performance in the past years.

It also aimed at setting new targets and strategizing towards achieving the objectives for 2012. The conference offered the district assemblies the opportunity to discuss the challenges they have been facing in ensuring the distribution of water to their centre’s. Outlining some of the achievements of the agency, Mr Bugase said 1,318 boreholes had been constructed and 36 others rehabilitated while 24 hand-dug wells were fitted with pumps.

Six new small community piped systems and 19 new mechanized boreholes were also completed among others. The Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, Mr Enoch T. Mensah , urged the Community Water and Sanitation Agency (CWSA) to take charge of the execution of all community water projects to ensure the proper maintenance of all ongoing projects.

This, he said would enable the agency to keep track of all community projects to avoid shoddy work by contractors. In a speech read on his behalf by a deputy minister, Nii Nortey Duah, he said the government in the midst of financial challenges had made strident efforts to ensure that 20,000 boreholes were drilled to increased access to safe water.

“There is always the need to ensure that we pursue every activity with the general good of society as our motivation. Our actions should be guided by the need to ensure value for money,” he said.

Mr Mensah urged the agency and all its stakeholders to explore all the practical steps that could be adopted sustainability of the programme. “You should not seek your personal interest at the expense of the national cause” he said.

The Ashanti Regional Minister, Dr Kwaku Agyemang-Mensah, urged the agency to intensify its operation to ensure that citizens, particularly those in the rural areas, benefitted from potable water supply.

According to him, a large number of households in both rural and urban areas continued to rely on streams and rivers as their main source of water for domestic and other uses. “Time and effort tend to be spent by women and school children, particularly girls “he said.

Source: Daily Graphic

Bookmark with: