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Rains are down - Appalling attitudes, practices badly exposed!

Our detestable attitudes and practices towards the environment have badly exposed us once again with just a couple of downpours.

How one wishes “Operation clean your frontage” prosecutions had kicked in long before.

Exactly a week ago, the outcome of the rain that hit us in Accra and Tema reminded one that the Accra filth and bushes had not gone anywhere. They were ready to overtake us once again.

Shameful attitude

The selfish, lawless and shameful attitude we continue to exhibit in our communities without any guilt towards indiscriminate littering was evident last week.

Despicable sights all over a city gunning to be the cleanest in Africa.

The downpour which lasted for about two hours saw parts of the Accra -Tema Motorway flooded. I got caught up in the downpour on my way to Tema using the motorway that morning.

Within minutes, the intensity of the rain, coupled with strong winds reduced visibility on the motorway. Several motorists saw the need to park on the sides of the road, most of them near the Accra and Tema end of the abandoned tollbooths, possibly for safety reasons.

The 100-kilometre-per-hour speed limit of the motorway suddenly reduced to 50 kilometres for most drivers.

Manoeuvring on a flooded motorway with potholes at some portions was quite dangerous and care was the best caution for even the best of drivers.

But as we traversed our vehicles through the flooded motorway, one’s mind went back to the indiscipline that had generally engulfed our community living and which had stretched to the one and only motorway we had. The end result was the flooding witnessed with that day’s downpour.

I live in Accra and used to work in Tema for nearly 10 years, so the motorway is very familiar to me.

The lawless encroachment and unauthorised developments around the stretch and the human settlement so close to the road have all contributed to indiscriminate littering and blockages to natural flow of rainwater in the area.

That was not the case when I used to use the motorway on a daily basis; a pointer to the fact that we are not getting any better in our attitude to the environment.

Filth

Coming back to Accra that Saturday was even more depressing. The heavy rain had vomited out onto the streets all the hidden filth, including plastics and other debris from our uncovered drains.

The streets were ugly sites but so were the frontage of homes, markets and commercial properties even 24 hours later. We do not seem to hear;

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