Jospong appeals to media, religious bodies to support sanitation campaigns

The Executive Chairman of the Jospong Group of Companies and Zoomlion Ghana Limited, Mr. Joseph Siaw Agyepong has urged the media to give environmental sanitation similar attention it gave to illegal mining (galamsey) in order to help achieve President Akufo-Addo's vision of a clean Ghana.

The Ghanaian media led the campaign against the galamsey menace which yielded positive results, as the quality and levels of water in some water bodies have improved.

It is against this backdrop that Mr Agyepong made the call when he met the media to update them on the operations of his companies in Accra.

“It is against this backdrop that I am appealing to you the media to support the waste managers and government to ensure that people’s attitude towards waste is changed for the better”.

“Instead of wasting your precious times on non-existent stories, as some of you do, I appeal to you to give environmental sanitation your attention as it will go a long way to bring health and generate more wealth into our local economy”  he said.

Mr Agyepong said the private sector has taken pragmatic and innovative measures to support the President's vision but what is lacking is an organised effort to support by the media, the religious bodies, civil society organizations, traditional leaders and the MMDAs to enforce just the by-laws.

 “The challenge of environmental cleanliness appears insurmountable but with sheer commitment and a collective resolution by all key players such as waste managers, the media, government, civil society organisations and the individual citizens of Ghana, I am certain that we can surmount it and nib it in the bud once and for all.
 
More importantly the president’s vision and mantra about cleanliness should be our guiding modus operandi to ensure that our country especially the gateway to Africa which is our capital Accra is kept clean at all times”, he urged.

According to him, the problem of the waste is not about the waste managers cleaning everywhere daily but the attitude of Ghanaians towards waste disposal and towards the waste managers themselves.

He observed that with a conscientised population on waste management and the enforcement of the laws, Ghana will be like London, Dubai and Singapore among others.

"If you gave half of the attention the media gave to the galamsey issue to sanitation and waste management we wouldn’t still be here so my appeal is let us do more in this direction”.

He added that the group over the past years has initiated programmes aimed at curbing waste problems confronting the country.

The latest, according to Agyepong is the One Million Household Bin Project which he said is to ensure that every household is given a waste bin to dispose of their waste for collection.

“I always say even in the church and mosque where there are God fearing people if there are no waste bins the waste generated there due to human activity will find its way into the gutters and that has been our bane”.

Mr. Agyepong was hopeful that after the encounter, the media will rise with a renewed momentum to support the One Household, One Bin project to succeed, saying “if we have waste bins there in the households, the office premises, the hospitals, the schools, the churches and mosques and even the shrines and in the markets and streets, more than 90 per cent of our waste will no longer go into the gutters or public places by win to cause floods and disasters”.