There is an imminent cholera outbreak in Tease the District Capital of Afram Plains South in the Eastern Region due to increasing open defecation as four public toilet facilities serving the Community are in perilous conditions with some on the verge of collapse.
Apart from this, the public toilet facilities are full but not being emptied due to financial constraints and lack of vacuum trucks at the Afram Plains South District Assembly.
Over the years, the Public Toilets are emptied through manual means by persons hired outside the district but that seems expensive for the Committees in charge of the toilet facilities citing inadequate revenue.
The suck away pits of some of the toilet facilities have also developed deep cracks spilling over the human excreta emit pungent stench to nearby homes while breeding house flies exposing residents to various diseases.
With the onset of the rains, residents fear the outbreak of Cholera is imminent as many residents prefer defecating in the open than that attending risking their lives to defecate on perilous toilet facilities.
A toilet operator told mybrytfmonline.com that few people who visit her facility refuse to pay 20 pesewas charge claiming because the facility is not neat.
“People don’t come here but the few who come too they don’t want to pay whenever they came here that the place is dirty and smell. We always fight with them. So we want the toilet rehabilitated.”
Some residents appealed for rehabilitation or construction of befitting public toilet facilities to serve the district Capital.
“This is Tease, a district Capital but look at our toilet facilities very deplorable. The toilets are collapsing now we don’t even allow our younger children to attend because it can cave in anytime”
“As for me, I don’t go to that toilet. When I go to my farm I just go to the toilet in the bush. They say we should build our own toilets facilities in our homes but this is a farming community we don’t have money. Look around there are houseflies all over. The stench from the toilet alone is dangerous for us living around.”
Some Children were seen risking their lives just to attend to nature’s call in a collapsing toilet facility which has been closed for public use but many residents still sneak to ease themselves due to the absence of toilet facilities in the area.
“They say we should not come here again but people come. My little sister defecated in the bush here but I went inside they have defecated all over the place “.
The Krontihene of Pitiku Traditional Area Nana Adu Parko II who doubles as a government appointee at the District Assembly is worried by the development but says the District Assembly is discouraging over dependant on public toilet facilities, therefore, encouraging landlords to construct their toilets.
He was however concerned over lack of pipe-borne water system in the community making it difficult to construct Water closets in homes
“The situation is worrying but the assembly is discouraging dependence on public toilet facilities so want people to have their toilet facilities. The only challenge is that there is water challenge in this community we don’t have taps in our homes only depend on a few boreholes but we have been promised some more will be drilled.”
Tease Community is deprived of many basic social amenities such as tarred roads, pipe-borne water, and robust health system among others despite being one of the food basket areas of the community.
Source: Mybrytfmonline/Obed Ansah
