Kumasi, Oct. 19, GNA - Descendants of the Volta Region, resident in the Ashanti Region, are to embark on a mass clean up exercise in the various suburbs of the Kumasi metropolis and communities in the Ashanti Region on October 22, this year.

The exercise, which forms part of the Amu Za traditional festival of some ethnic groups of the Volta Region, would involve the desilting of choked gutters, sweeping and weeding of bushes at the Manhyia Hospital and its environs.

The exercise would also be undertaken in all communities in which people of the Volta Region descent reside in the Ashanti Region. Togbe S. K. Fugah, Chief of the Anloga community in Kumasi, announced this at a meeting held by the Voltarian Co-ordinating Council (VCC) with Ethnic groups and tribal heads, resident at Anloga on Tuesday.

Togbe Fugah said the essence of formally informing the tribal heads at Anloga is to crave their indulgence and support, and to entice them to also actively participate in the exercise and not to see it as an exercise solely reserved for those from the Volta Region alone. He said the festival, which brings people together to reconcile with each other, is the first to be celebrated outside the Volta Region, and has been dedicated to the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, for his fatherly concern for ethnic groups residing within his kingdom. Mr Young Attivor, Ashanti Regional Organiser of the VCC, advised all and sundry to dedicate and sacrifice their time on that Saturday for the clean up exercise in view of its importance.

Mr C. Y. Fianyor, Chairman of the Planning Committee of the Amu Za festival, said other activities like lectures, dancing and traditional drumming, formed part of the festival, but stressed that the most crucial was the clean up exercise, since it deals with environmental and personal hygiene issues.