Sewerage plants commissioned at Ashaiman, Bankuman

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo on Wednesday commissioned a $6.6 million simplified sewage facility and treatment plant at Ashaiman and a rehabilitated and expanded Bankuman simplified sewage plant, both in the Greater Accra Region.

The two facilities comprise 51 kilometres of sewer lines and a new waste water treatment plant with the capacity of some 1800 cubic metre per day to serve some 4,805 households in Ashaiman, while the plant at Bankuman, with the capacity of 1,600 cubic metres per day, is to serve some 3,100 households.

Commissioning the project, President Akufo-Addo said the facilities were a clear indication of government’s commitment to offer solutions to the infrastructural gap identified as one of the major challenges plaguing the sanitation and water resources sector.

He said the simplified sewerage system, as well as the rehabilitated Bankuman project, would benefit the people living within the catchment areas of Ashaiman and Bankuman.

Interventions

Under the Greater Accra Metropolitan Area (GAMA) Sanitation and Water Project, conceived as one of the pro-poor interventions to ensure the policy of “One House-One Toilet”, 48,641 improved household toilets have benefited some 389,128 people as of December 2020.

The President said additionally, 406 improved and modern disability-friendly, gender sensitive institutional toilet facilities, benefiting some 251,872 schoolchildren, had been completed as of December 2020.

The Ashaiman Sanitation plant after the commissioning ceremony

He said the GAMA Project had been so successfully executed that additional financing was sought and obtained from the World Bank to extend the intervention to the Greater Kumasi Metropolitan Area.

He noted that under the additional financing, a total of 129 improved and modern disability-friendly, gender sensitive institutional toilet facilities, as well as 30,000 household toilet facilities were under construction for beneficiary schools and individual households in the Greater Kumasi Metropolitan Area.  

The Kumasi Project, President Akufo-Addo said, would also expand and rehabilitate the 29-year-old Asafo sewerage system in Kumasi, provide an additional 12,000 household toilets and 30 institutional toilets in the Greater Kumasi Metropolitan Area. 

Components

Component One of the Greater Kumasi Project, he added, would extend potable water, by laying some 120 kilometres of pipelines, and provide 5,000 new service connections; establish a telemetry, and also retool the Ghana Water Company’s metre shop to reduce non-revenue water.

“Ghana has made significant strides towards the attainment of the 2030 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals on water and sanitation. Currently, access to basic drinking water services has increased from 79 per cent of the population in 2017 to 87.7 per cent in 2021,” he said.

He further said access to improved toilet facilities, including public toilets, had also increased from 66 per cent to 80.8 per cent within the same period.

He gave an assurance that government was investing $1.4 billion in several water and sanitation projects nationwide, adding that some of these projects had been completed, and others were still ongoing.

“It is expected that some 5.3 million people will benefit from these interventions when completed,” he said.

The Minister of Sanitation and Water Resources, Freda Akosua Prempeh, commended her predecessor, Cecilia Abena Dapaah, for the transformative water, sanitation and hygiene initiatives implemented over the years to ensure that all the people living in Ghana had access to adequate safe, affordable and reliable basic water services.

She said the new sewerage treatment facilities would reduce the risks of infections and enhance the living standards of beneficiary populations within the catchment areas of the projects.