City managers are yet to overcome factors responsible for the annual flooding of Accra and it is worrying. The annual occurrence continues to bother the nation’s capital; every downpour conjures scary moments in the minds of residents no matter the duration.
That no downpour is too brief to be ignored is a fact amply evidenced by the under ninety minutes of rainfall last Sunday which left in its trail deaths and missing persons.
The bottom-line is that the nation’s capital with its current infrastructure deficit and indiscipline alongside in the face of an overwhelming plastic pollution cannot withstand a three-hour consistent downpour.
We are appalled at the poor quality job executed in what was touted by the previous administration as a civil engineering masterpiece at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle.
The spot with its overhead bridges has multiple civil engineering challenges which must be addressed now lest the spot remains a flood-prone zone annually when the rains are here the fallouts of which are always nightmarish.
For how long shall downpours continue to kill Accra residents when solutions for the challenges are not beyond the authorities and the residents of the city?
Following the Circle disaster of 2015 in which an unprecedented number of lives were lost, many promises were made by the government in place at the time; four years since then the location continues to be a source of concern each time it rains or when the rainy season beckons.
The observation of the Greater Accra Regional National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) by Archibald Cobbinah that those who died did not do so near the major drains in the city but in areas far away from them explains the point that indiscipline on the part of residents accounts to a certain extent for the floods which visit the city annually.
As to how to enforce the by-laws of the city just so our gutters will be spared the volume of garbage which are dumped into them by residents is something we are yet to find answers to. The will to enforce these laws require the willpower to do so and consistently for the desired impact to be achieved.
Structures still stand on waterways and compel rainwater with ferocious currents to find its way as it destroys property and sometimes lives as it does so.
At the time we composed our editorial on plastics a few days ago, little did we know that last Sunday’s force majeure was lurking, ready to strike. Sometimes, we are constrained to find out whether indeed these are natural disasters or the fallouts from our indiscipline or the inability by local authorities to enforce the laws.
We are not learning from previous experiences. Inasmuch as we continue to tread on the same trajectory, similar outcomes will visit the city whenever the rainy season arrives as it has done already.