I have listened to so many commentators on the electronic media ever since the announcement was made by the Ghana Water Company Limited that due to the severe harmattan conditions and the drying up of sources of water intake for the activities of the Company, water supply is going to be rationed in the coming months until the rains begin to fall. The truth of the matter is that water is next to air, in fact clean air, in the lives of living organisms and therefore any announcement of water shortage should be of concern to humanity.
The situation even becomes very precarious if the shortages occur in the urban centres and cities like Accra, Sekondi-Takoradi, Kumasi, Tamale, Tema, please add to them. It is just a terrible situation to envisage. Even in normal times when water is supposed to be flowing, all of us are aware of the fact that consumers have a lot of challenges in having safe, clean potable water. So if it is announced that there is going to be rationing of water because the volumes and quantities needed to be distributed cannot be available for whatever reason, it gives cause for worry.
My concern is about the commentaries and the positions some of the commentators have taken and the blame being pushed onto the Ghana Water Company Limited. As a people, the biggest challenge confronting us is the shortsightedness with which we go about things, observe things and make decisions on them.
Water, we all know, is a natural resource that comes from varying sources, rivers, streams, dams, etc etc. Humanity uses water for various activities and it is therefore the responsibility of mankind to protect water bodies of all sources to support life and human existence. Ghana Water Company does not manufacture raw water to be refined for our consumption. The company depends on the amount of water nature has been gracious enough to offer us for free.
Over the almost last two decades or more, this country has sat down unconcerned as some citizens, for their individual selfishness, continue to degrade our water bodies and forests with reckless abandon as if there was no tomorrow. Have we sat down to analyze why the Volta Dam has for more than a decade not overflowed and water spilled? Why are the Burkinabes virtually spilling water from their Dam almost every year but the Akosombo Dam is still producing below capacity?  Burkina Faso is closer to the Sahelian region than we are.  It is a matter of discipline in the management of natural resources.
Over the past six years, I have had the occasion to write on the destruction of our water bodies because I saw the destruction on a daily basis. My research water bodies are the Pra and the Ankobra rivers – all in my beloved Western Region. This nation sat down and murmured in silence and perhaps in fear, as criminals openly, in broad day light, polluted these two river bodies which are the sources of raw water for the Ghana Water Company for treatment to the consuming public within the region. This nation was blind to these activities.
In the year 2016, the then Minister for Water Resources, Works and Housing, my very good friend, Dr. Agyeman Mensah had the opportunity to visit the Daboase Water intake to assess the situation. He asked the Chiefs and the people of the area to invoke curses on the galamseyers who were destroying the water bodies, primarily the Pra River. In the 21st Century, a PHD holder was advocating the use of curses to deal with physical and criminal problem. How that would have stopped the criminals is best known to him.
So if today those of us within the Sekondi-Takoradi and its environs are not getting water from the GWCL, who do we blame? That the Birim river had been a subject of assault by illegal diamond miners was known to all of us. Staff of GWCL had complained about the turbidity and highly polluted state of the river and their inability to treat water for consumption was also known to all of us. I lived and schooled at Dunkwa on Offin in the Central Region, I saw River Offin even though being officially dredged for gold, it was relatively clean and a source of raw water for the GWCL’s treated water supply to Dunkwa and its neighbouring communities.
We sat down to see the free flowing river being bastardized beyond reason and not even fit for the consumption of cattle. GWCL cried out and no one listened to them. Apart from the direct destruction of these major water bodies, smaller rivers and streams that feed these major bodies have been wiped off the geographical map of Ghana. We saw it, we were quiet and perhaps supported the perpetrators of these criminal acts that were endangering our collective future with the excuse that there are no jobs.
What is worse, citizens without conscience went ahead to destroy the flora and fauna that protected and gave life to the river bodies with such glee and speed without a thought for the future. The end result is that many of our river bodies, those that are alive, are seriously silted such that they cannot hold enough water even during the rainy season. This is also one of the causes of flooding that takes place with the least rainfall which also pulls down bridges, homes and create social and economic challenges for us. Coupled with the destruction of the protective cover, the little water stored, evaporated so fast that even before the main dry season, we have very little store of raw water to use for any meaningful activity.
The Bia Forests in the Western Region have been desecrated, the Atiwa Forest has suffered the assault of the marauding criminals. We saw them, we paid lip service to them and the result is that we have very little raw water nationwide to treat for our consumption. Why blame the GWCL if it has no raw water to treat and pump to us? The most dangerous aspect of this development is the fear that if care is not taken, by the year 2025, this country will have to import water for domestic and other uses. Import from where?
This is the price an indisciplined society has to pay. We are a people of parochial mindset, shortsighted in our plan, selfish in our dealings, so fatuous in thought and fanatically obstinate in our approach to matters affecting this great nation. Why do we do this to this country? If we cannot add to what nature gives us, do we have to destroy what we have to meet and expose the unborn generation to more penury and hopelessness? Why oo Why? I’m getting angry.
It is just easy in Ghana today for people to point accusing fingers at institutions and individuals for what has gone wrong without looking at our own contributions. We are so mindless that it is so difficult for us to even harvest rain when we build houses. We fill the open spaces with concrete and other related materials instead of planting trees and grasses to reduce climate warming.
Yes, we pride ourselves as the most intelligent group of people on the continent; may be book knowledge yes, but we simply don’t think. That is the truth about us.  If we have to solve this water problem in the long term, then we have to look for money to dredge all our major rivers, including the Volta at certain parts of the Northern Region, plant trees along the banks of all our major rivers and nurture them to give cover to the rivers. This is not for our sake, but for the generations yet unborn.  I know am talking about hundreds of millions of United State dollars which we may not have. But which will be more expensive in the long term? Having to import water in the next 10 years or taking remedial measures to save the future generation? The choice is ours but nobody should blame the GWCL. A people get what they deserve. I am very sad.
Daavi, give me four tots.
Kb2014gh@gmail.com