By Michael Kofi Kenetey
Some deviant community members at New Tafo have taken over the Roman Catholic Basic School sanitation facility in the Abuakwa North Municipality of the Eastern Region as their only place of convenience, leading to the subsequent destruction of the facility.
This has compelled the pupils to ease themselves in the bush close to the school.
The situation has forced the Municipal Education Director, Abena Gyamera, to call on the community’s traditional authorities and opinion leaders to intervene so the people can desist from such acts.
She made the call when the SOS Children’s Villages in Asiakwa commissioned and handed over a 12-seater modern sanitation facility with changing rooms for girls to the school to help solve the sanitation challenge of the school.
The SOS Children’s Villages Ghana in Asiakwa is a local branch of an international humanitarian organisation that provides needed assistance to abandoned and destitute children with safe, stable homes and loving families.
In Ghana, the organisation supports local children and young people with daycare, education, medical assistance, vocational training, and healthy sanitation.
It is as a result of this that the organisation decided to intervene in the sanitation challenge confronting the basic school and construct a modern sanitation facility for the New Tafo R/C Basic School.
The village also renovated sanitation facilities for four other primary schools in the municipality to help solve their sanitation challenges.
In an interview during the commissioning of the project, the Municipal Education Director, Abena Gyamera, demonstrated her displeasure about the situation and appealed to the traditional authorities to help prevent members of the community from such acts.
The Abuakwa North Municipal Chief Executive, Alhaji Omar Babs Bodinga, noted that the municipality will liaise with the traditional rulers and assembly members to ensure the situation is tackled.
The National Director of SOS Children’s Villages Ghana, Anthony Owusu Gyamfi, urged parents to devote their time to their children’s welfare and education, especially young girls, in order to prevent them from getting pregnant at a tender age.
He noted that the aim of the organisation is to support abandoned and destitute children to be better people in future.
Responding to the issues raised by the Municipal Education Director, the Assemblyman for Mangoase Electoral Area in the Abuakwa North Municipality, William Afare Agyemang, noted that they will do everything within their capacity to prevent those deviant community members from taking over the new facility.
He noted that anyone who flouts the directive will be arrested for unlawful entry and prosecuted.
