Ghana has two major seasons; the wet and dry seasons. The wet season which is known as the rainy has proved to be a curse to Ghanaians. It starts from June and ends late August. This year and previous years have seen devastating effect of the rain because of our stupidity wrapped in toxic behavioral syndrome. Next year the rain will set in again and predictably, Accra often erroneously touted as the Gateway to Africa will be submerged in floods again. Honestly this is not getting funny any longer. It exposes our mentality and passive attitude. After the infamous twin flood and fire disaster that destroyed lives and properties, lots of us thought that would have been the catalyst to spin our faculties into result oriented mechanism.
Politicians are constantly blamed for this avoidable canker but I believe we as a nation we have collectively failed woefully. A chunk of the populace is stubbornly lazy and dirty. Despite the massive campaign aimed at sensitizing people about good sanitary practice, people still have the guts to throw rubbish around indiscriminately. This is just appalling to say the least.
It’s really shocking to see people who call themselves intellectuals get involved in this bad practice yet they are the ones who come out to ‘talk plenty’ when their actions and inactions contribute to this problem.
Right after the flood that became the worst in the annals of this nation, a daring Canadian man placed a $10, 000 bet on Twitter and forecasted Accra will be flooded again. His assumption was based on the history of flood in the country to which nothing pragmatic has been done to put a stop to it. He said, “Normally I do not bet on events like floods because of their unpredictability. But in events in Accra are slightly different. Having done a quick Google search, I discovered these floods and the resulting destruction have been occurring year after year. And the Ghanaian authorities always make the same promises the following year. I don’t have to be a genius to work out what will happen next year. It’s pretty obvious so I thought I’d put some money on #AccraFloods trending again in 2016.” This Canadian gambler has really summed up the degree of our folly.
Accra, by its topography is prone to flood. Successive governments and policy makers should have been prudent enough to construct big underground drains to carry the gushing water straight to the ocean. The mayor and other corrupt officials have superintended over builders siting their structures on waterways. We have been become a breed of people who only respond to situations after it has caused devastating effect. In this contemporary era people still die of preventable diseases like cholera and malaria just because of this our lackadaisical attitude I mentioned in the preceding paragraphs.
Right after people died from cholera, these politicians decreed that all eatery should be thoroughly scrutinize, which lead to the closure of several restaurants; whose operations were directly proportional to the cholera menace. Then there was the introduction of the clean-up exercise which shockingly was shunned some people who said their political affiliation prevents them from partaking in the exercise. Can you believe this?
The perpetual flood is a collective failure on our part and its exposes the extent of our brain capacity which ultimately defines our ineptitude. If we really want to develop the country and enhance living conditions, it should start with prioritizing with the simplest things to solve relatively avoidable problems like this.
