President Mahama announces monthly community cleanup initiative

President John Dramani Mahama has announced plans to institutionalize a monthly national cleanup exercise as part of efforts to improve sanitation and reduce flooding across the country.

Speaking during the National Cleanup Exercise at Alajo in the Greater Accra Region, the President said while the ongoing two-day campaign was an important step, sustained community participation would be required to keep drains and public spaces clean.

“Two days are not enough to finish this work, but we are going to institute it so that at least one day every month, all of us should come out and clean our surroundings,” he said.

President Mahama said the initiative seeks to revive Ghana’s long-standing tradition of communal labour, noting that citizens were once taught to take responsibility for maintaining clean environments.

“That is what our traditional values were about. We were taught to keep a clean environment, but when we all leave our hometowns and we come because of the anonymity of urbanization, we think that nobody watches us. We must change that attitude,” he stated.

The President also called on Ghanaians to stop dumping refuse into drains, describing the practice as a major contributor to flooding. According to him, the cleanup at the Alajo drain, part of the Odaw stream, uncovered large amounts of silt, plastics, household waste, engine blocks, furniture and other discarded items that had obstructed the free flow of water.

He urged residents to use skip containers provided across the city for proper waste disposal instead of turning drains into dumping sites.

President Mahama further disclosed that the Minister for Finance had released GH¢150 million to support flood mitigation measures, including the dredging of streams and drains.

He said the Ghana Armed Forces would continue desilting operations after the two-day cleanup exercise and that government would procure additional backhoes to help remove excavated silt and debris into tipper trucks for disposal at designated sites.

According to the President, removing the waste from drainage channels is essential to ensuring that the cleanup effort has a lasting impact.

The monthly cleanup initiative forms part of the government’s broader strategy to strengthen sanitation, prevent flooding and encourage citizens to play an active role in keeping their communities clean.