Adolescents at Baakoniaba, a suburb of Sunyani, have appealed for water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) facilities to improve their personal and community hygiene, and to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030.
Target 6.2 of the global goals enjoins countries around the globe to achieve access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation, paying special attention to the needs of women and girls and those in vulnerable situations.
However, just about six years ahead, the adolescents, mostly girls, observed that the lack of a public toilet, pipe borne and clean water in the area remained a huge community challenge that needed to be addressed urgently.
They also appealed for a community library, and the reshaping of the town roads to enhance their wellbeing.
The girls made the appeal at an adolescent engagement forum, organised by the Sunyani-based Global Media Foundation (GloMeF), a non-government organisation that works to advance the gene
ral wellbeing of vulnerable people, under the implementation of the foundation’s Resilient City for Adolescents Projects.
Being funded by the Swiss Botnar Foundation at the cost of £300,000, the implementation of the three-year adolescent inclusive project seeks to improve the lives of adolescents in the country, targeting to directly benefit 1,500 young people and indirectly reach out to 3000 boys and girls.
The girls, between ages 13 and 16 years, expressed worry that it was often difficult to change their clothes in schools duringtheir menstruation because of the lack of WASH facilities and water.
They said the lack of public toilets and the perennial acute water shortage affected their wellbeing, and it was always uneasy for those of them who did not have household toilets.
hey appealed to the Sunyani Municipal Assembly and other NGOs and UN Agencies to come to their aid.
Responding to the appeal, Mr. Samuel Kofi Adagbodzo, the Sunyani Municipal Planning Officer, said the Ghana Water Company Limited
(GWCL) was undertaking expansion works to extend pipe borne water to the under-served and deprived communities in the municipality.
That notwithstanding, he gave the assurance that some of the pressing needs of adolescents would be forwarded and captured in the short-term development plan of the assembly for the needed attention.
Mr. Adagbodzo indicated that the Assembly had procured and distributed 1,000 community dustbins and further placed 10 large containers for waste collection at some neighbourhoods and called on interested households and individuals to approach and collect some of the dustbins which were still in stock.
Mr Raphael Godlove Ahenu, the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of GloMeF, explained that the implementation of the project further sought to offer employable skill training to the vulnerable youth in the Sunyani and Sunyani West Municipality.
They are being trained in bead making, soap production, body and face make-ups and others to make them live decent lives.
Source: Ghana N
ews Agency