The Deputy Director-General of NADMO, Seji Saji Amedonu, has said that the organisation has been undertaking a continuous pumping of stagnant water in affected areas from the Akosombo Dam spillage.
He explained that after the spillage, the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) realised the need to devise channels to allow for water that had stagnated in these communities, could be redirected out.
He added that while that was done, NADMO had to move to pump out the water because the earlier plan was not fully successful.
Speaking at a Meet the Press in Accra, Seji Saji Amedonu stressed that this has now been going on for about a week.
“We are involved in pumping stagnant water now. When the water receded after about a week, we realised that the nature of some of the areas – those places were naturally wetlands, but as usual, people have developed those places to live in. so, the water could not go back so we worked closely with the district assembly to try and create a channel for the water to go.
“We worked on that for about a week and realised that there were still some level of water in the community and we had to find a way. So, we had mobilised some pumps, working closely with the military – the 48 Engineers Regiment and the Ghana Navy, we have been engaged in pumping water for the next 10 days. This is going to continue for some time because yesterday when we did the assessment, we realised that we still need to continue the pumping. So, this will continue for some time,” he explained.
Several communities in the Volta and Oti Regions took on a huge hit when excess water that had been spilled from the Akosombo and Kpong Dams, displacing several hundreds of thousands in those communities.
The government has since then been making several attempts at restoring these communities, even as several charitable persons and institutions continue to donate to the affected communities.