Member of Parliament for Navrongo Central, Joseph Kofi Adda, has announced that he will commit himself to the provision of 1,000 household toilet facilities in the Navrongo area to help in the fight against Open Defecation.

He said he will, in line with government policies on sanitation, work assiduously to help improve sanitation in the area and also construct the toilets to support the Assembly make Navrongo Open Defecation Free (ODF).

Speaking at the durbar of Chiefs and people of the Navrongo Traditional Area, when President Akufo Addo visited them on the second day of his two-day working visit of the Upper East Region, Mr. Adda, commended the Kasena-Nankana Municipal Assembly for coming out top as the best municipality in the area of sanitation in the country.

He called on the Assembly to strengthen and double their efforts to completely eliminate Open Defecation in Navrongo and deal with the challenge once and for all.

He said, “Navrongo is doing very well in the area of sanitation. The assembly is working hard and when I was at the sanitation ministry, we worked together as one and through the minister and an NGO which promotes competition among the assemblies, the Kasena-Nankana municipal assembly was selected as the best of all municipalities in the country in the area of sanitation and won 25, 000 pounds”.

“Mr. President, in line with your policies on sanitation, I will like to suggest that our municipality should work towards ending open defecation in Navrongo, as I also do my very best in support. I stand here today, Mr. President, and commit to making available 1,000 household toilets to support in the fight to end open defecation in Navrongo”.

He thanked President Akufo Addo for the Navrongo Water Treatment Plant project, Tono Dam and canals Renovation project and his several life- changing initiatives that the Chiefs and people of Navrongo have enjoyed under his leadership.

Mr. Adda, praised the Paramount Chief of Navrongo, Pe Denis Asagpaare Balinia Adda, for leading the initiative to plant over 2,000 trees in commemoration of his one year as Chief of the town.

He announced a donation of 1,000 improved tree seedlings to support the brilliant initiative of the Paramount Chief which seeks to improve and encourage tree growth in the area.

“Mr. President, I will like to commend the Navoro-Pio for taking the initiative to plant trees in Navrongo to commemorate his first year as chief. I will support his brilliant initiative by making available 1,000 seedlings of improved trees to the Chief and his opinion leaders to plant throughout Navrongo to end desertification”. He pledged.

With a brief history of the slave trade and the activities of the colonial slave masters, the MP who doubles as Ghana’s Aviation Minister, commended government for the “Year of Return” project and appealed to the President to include Navrongo as one of the tourism destinations when Africans from the Northern Hemisphere come into the country to reconnect with their roots.

He hinted of plans to construct some memorial monumental structures including an Emancipation Gate Arch to signify the liberation of black people from the slave trade and to tell the story and the role Navrongo and its people played in ending the trade that killed many of its people and sold out others as slaves to the western world.

”Mr. President, where we are standing today is a safe ground. I say this because Namolo was where a battle was fought. The battle of Bagaa. Bagaa was the southern commander for the slave traders- Toure and Babatu. Here, the battle was fought for several months. Many people from Navrongo were killed.
Here, we the Kasena-Nankana people ended slavery through our own efforts.

Bagaa the slave trader was overpowered and executed and we ended the slave trade in Navrongo even before the emancipation proclamation in the USA.
I bring this matter up because Mr. President, you are the only President who has commemorated this unfortunate, sad and atrocious event nationwide and globally and I think it’s important that we remember that the people in this area also fought and ended slavery. So, when our brothers and sisters from the southern hemisphere come to Ghana, they don’t just have to end at the castles and forts on the coast but also come here because this is where the slaves were actually taken from.

Mr. President, I commit to build three memorials emancipation gate arches, which will be similar to the Independence Arch, with the inscription “Freedom and Justice” that will be constructed on Namolo land and as you enter Navrongo, you enter into the emancipation gate”. He hinted.

On hospitality, Mr. Adda promised to use his share of the 1million dollars per Constituency to rehabilitate the NAK building complex in the centre of Navrongo to open up the hospitality sector and unleash its potential in the area.