DREDGING of the Odaw River, which is virtually choked with garbage, has commenced in earnest, ahead of this year’s rainy season.
The project, being undertaken by the Zoomlion Ghana Limited, a waste management company, at the cost of GH¢2 million, began at Caprice in Accra on Thursday.
The company yesterday resumed the dredging of the section of the river near the Graphic Road.
The Odaw River has become a dumping ground for solid waste and a receptacle for human excreta.
The Public Relations Manager of Zoomlion, Mr Robert Coleman, told the Daily Graphic that the company expected to desilt a significant portion of the river in the next two months.
According to him, squatters and residents in the catchment area continued to dump waste in the river even as the dredging was going on.
That and other human activities, he said, were disrupting operations of the company.
“We have, therefore, resolved to create a fence around the work area to hedge the activities of squatters and traders from further polluting the river,” Mr Coleman said.
He warned that the company would haul before the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA)’s sanitation court persons caught engaging in activities that were likely to cause unnecessary delays in the execution of the project.
The Odaw River, which serves as a major inlet for liquid waste into the Korle Lagoon, has over the years suffered from severe pollution.
The shallowness and grossly polluted state of the river have also rendered it unsuitable for navigation or recreation or even fishing, thereby adversely affecting the Korle Lagoon, which once served as a fishing ground.
In spite of some major dredging works carried out between 2002 and 2004, increasing population and socio-economic activities, coupled with the erection of illegal structures along the banks, have combined to undermine the survival of the river.
SOURCE: Della Russel Ocloo, Daily Graphic, Sat, March 17, 2012
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