NGO pushes for ban on packaged water

… Encourages Ghanaians to go back to the taps
Posted: The Chronicle |Thursday, February 18, 2010

By Charles Takyi - Boadu

The Ghana Coalition of Non-Governmental Organisations in the Water and Sanitation Sector (CONIWAS) is advocating for a total ban on thin plastics used in the production of packaged water in the country.
It believes the production and consumption pattern of sachet water is not sustainable, since environmental pollution of thin plastics, and the associated economic costs to the nation, far outweighed the employment benefits it creates for those who engage in it.

It has therefore welcomed the government decision to place a 20% ad valerom tax on the product, since according to the group, abandoning tap water altogether, as a result of what it describes as marketing gimmicks and perceived poor quality, and resorting to packaged water as a main source of drinking water, constitutes development in the wrong direction.

Speaking at a news conference in Accra yesterday, Vice Chair of CONIWAS and Director of Public Policy Women and Development GrassRoots Africa, Hawa Nibi Amenga-Etego, stressed the urgent need for Ghanaians to shun packaged water, and to revert to the use of taps, since “the infiltration of bottled and sachet water into our market has become the biggest threat to the realisation of the right to water in Ghana.”

She argued that the decision had successfully diverted people’s attention away from more affordable sources, to more expensive and unsustainable bottled and sachet water, which costs 500 times (in the case of sachet water) and 1,600 times (in the case of bottled water) higher than other improved sources of water such as the taps, with little or no more improvement in the quality.

Meanwhile, General Comment 15 (GC15) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) sets out the tripartite responsibility of states to respect, protect, and fulfill the right to water.

It further states that a state (nation) protects the right by preventing third parties (including private companies) from interfering with the enjoyment of the right, including the imposition of appropriate regulatory measures (including taxes) on such parties.

However, the majority of Ghanaians still heavily rely on tap water, and other improved sources beside the bottled and sachet ones, as their sole source of drinking water.

Information gathered from the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) indicates that only 8.2% of Ghanaians drink bottled and sachet water as a source of drinking water alongside other improved sources, with the urban being 15.2%, whilst the rural constitutes only 1.8%.

CONIWAS noted that the poor would constitute a small fraction of this percentage, hence the production of sachet and bottled water constitutes commodification of water and interference in the right of the people to water, which is a fundamental human right, insisting that “a service as essential as water, cannot be subject to market focus.”

Consequently, the group, in collaboration with the Foundation for Grassroots Initiatives in Africa (GrassRoots Africa), has urged Ghanaians to bring pressure to bear on the government, and demand sufficient water of acceptable quality through taps, as the only way to guarantee the enjoyment of the right to water by all.

It is also advocating for the government to focus the 20% ad valerom tax on water, rather than the packaging material, and asked for proceeds from the tax to be channeled to the relevant authorities to improve water supply.

CONIWAS is also pushing for a separate tax for plastics to be considered more broadly, beyond packaging material or bottled and sachet water, whilst calling on the government to appropriate 25% of the talk tax, and 5% of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) levy, to finance Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Services (WASH), considering that these services are pivotal to the development of all other sectors of the economy.

Just like the rural water levy of 2% on all utility bills, which goes to support investment in the rural subsector, the group is also asking the government to consider an additional charge of 1%, dedicated to the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL), solely for infrastructure investment, instead of depending entirely on donors for this.

Private sector gets facelift

…as BUSAC gets a plus …as BUSAC gets a plus
Posted: The Chronicle |Thursday, February 18, 2010

By Charles Takyi - Boadu

Ms. Hannah Tetteh, Minister of Trade & Industry
Industry players are gradually gaining confidence in some private sector initiatives, and their ability to partner the public sector in the development of the nation.
Typical is the case of the Director of the Local Government Training Institute (LGTI), Dr. Esther Ofei-Aboagye, who is overwhelmed at the contribution of the Business Sector Advocacy Challenge Fund (BUSAC-fund) to the development of the nation, since it became operational five years ago.

“Overall, the work of the BUSAC-fund has provided several initiatives and beginnings that could lead to real change in public sector responsiveness to private sector enablement,” was how she put it.

Beyond collaboration in investments, she said the BUSAC-fund’s interventions has fostered partnerships between the public sector and private sector groupings, by helping to break down walls of suspicion, and fostering cooperation and familiarisation.

Speaking at a BUSAC end-of-project event in Accra, Dr. Ofei-Aboagye stressed on the belief that public sector agencies’ suspicion of civil society groups and business associations and economic groupings, had reduced enough to respond to such invitations, and through the collaboration, gaining key contact points within the business community to work with.

That notwithstanding, she stated that considerable interest had been built amongst business associations to be pro-active in demanding engagement with public sector agencies.

She commended the management team of the project, and all stakeholders who helped in making the difference.

On her part, the Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Chamber of Mines, Dr. Joyce Aryee, emphasised how useful the Fund has been to the Chamber.

This, according to her, was evident in the fact that the BUSAC-fund had enhanced the Chamber’s advocacy capacity.

Furthermore, she noted, it had also been able to make impacts on the activities of regulatory bodies, including the Minerals Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and other civil society organisations.

BUSAC aims to make an impact by enabling the private sector, including business membership organisations, trades unions and media, to influence public policy formulation by undertaking appropriate research, developing evidence based policy positions, and advocating those positions with the government and other private sector institutions/organisations, which may be targeted by the action.

It was originally launched by DANIDA, as part of the broader Business Sector Programme Support, but now attracts support from the DFID (which is pooling its support through an arrangement with DANIDA) and the USAID (which is willing to support export related advocacy projects).

The arrangement to involve DFID and USAID is covered under a Memorandum of Understanding, agreed and signed in March 2005.

The fund management has been contracted by DANIDA to COWI, which has appointed Dr. Dale Rachmeler as Project Manager. He is assisted by a team recruited locally.

The Fund is accessible through a competitive demand-driven mechanism, and transparent selection of the best advocacy actions proposed by associations within the Private Sector.

The BUSAC-fund finances, through grants, up to 90% of the cost of the Advocacy Actions that are selected in each “Call for Application.”

The Actions are then implemented by the Grantees themselves, with the help of the Service Providers they may have chosen to complement theirs.

Rawlings` `Boy` tells it bluntly

NDC WILL LOSE 2012 ELECTIONS
… As `Better Ghana` agenda becomes a farce
Posted: Wednesday, February 17, 2010

By Charles Takyi - Boadu

Mohammed Abdulai Mubarakm alias Ras Mubarak, an activist of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) who contested the position of National Youth Organiser and lost, has told The Chronicle that it will be very difficult for his party to survive the 2012 general elections, if things do not change for the better.

According to him, the government’s much talked-about ‘Better Ghana’ agenda was gradually degenerating into a farce, and therefore stressed the urgent need to make amends before things get out of hand.

“It would be too difficult to go out and ask the suffering masses to re-elect a government that has conveniently frozen scholarships; has done little about providing opportunities for the more than sixty thousand graduates annually; not brought justice to families who were emasculated under Mr. Kufuor, and has spent its first year floundering,” he said.

This, according to him, were some of the reasons why former President Rawlings has been expressing reservations about the slow pace at which the Mills administration was handling the affairs of the country, saying, “obviously, former President Rawlings has plenty of reasons to be worried, because promises of a better Ghana are degenerating into a farce.”

Having campaigned in the various constituencies across the length and breadth of the country, as candidate for the position of National Youth Organiser, Mubarak said he was overwhelmed at the extent of discontentment at the grassroots level of the NDC.

He believed the level of discontentment among the rank and file of the party was a verdict on the government’s failures. The NDC activist said, “party members have justifiable anxieties over the direction of things in the country.

“They are worried because of the lack of opportunities, poor social services, justice for families who were emasculated under Mr. Kufuor, and the gradual and soft-touch approach to fulfilling the Better Ghana agenda,” he noted, adding, “the economy may be growing, but any unbiased observer knows life is so difficult for the working class.”

Though he admits that the Mills administration has done some good work in the areas of agriculture, with GDP growth in agric soaring up to 6.2 percent last year, against a target of 5.9, whilst 5,000 youths had begun training in mobile phone repairs and assembly, under the Natioanl Youth Employment Programme (NYEP) nationwide, with 1,800 from the three Northern regions, he indicated, “the extent of discontentment at the grassroot level of the NDC is serious.”

Whilst appreciating the fact that President Mills was not walking away from the challenges confronting the nation, he said, “if things do not turn around soon and fast, it would produce more internal and political recriminations.”

Mubarak also took on editors-in-chief of the New Crusading Guide, The Insight and The Enquirer newspapers respectively, Messrs. Abdul Malik Kweku Baako Jnr, Kwesi Pratt Jnr, Raymond Archer, together with Alhaji Bature, a media practitioner and a known supporter of the NDC, for their continuous criticisms of Mr. Rawlings.

According to him, the outpouring of grief and sympathy from all manner of persons across the country, especially those who traveled long distances to show solidarity with the Rawlings family when their house was gutted by fire over the weekend, should send a clear signal to the Alhaji Bature’s and Kweku Baako’s.

He accused Baako of over-stepping the line of civility, and resorting to what he describes as “journalism of personal vendetta against Jerry Rawlings.” “What Malik, Kwesi Pratt and now Raymond Archer don’t know is that the NDC is not like the main opposition party,” he said, emphasising that, “under the NPP, President Kufuor’s bribe-taking or source-greasing friends in the media over-praised him, and he became a roadblock, instead of a catalyst to positive change.”

At the time, he said people like Gabby Otchere-Darko, who gave constructive criticisms, were marginalised, while journalists like Malik Kweku Baako were praising Mr. Kufuor.

The failed National Youth Organiser futher said, “if Barack Obama were a Ghanaian and a member of the NDC, the Batures and Pratts would have used their appearances on radio and television to attack him for his courage to speak out against old politics.”

Years before he became president, he recalled how Obama had been critical of the Democratic Party and US politics in general, and the repeated attacks on the leadership of his party, even writing in page 38 of his book – The audacity of Hope - that “Democrats are, well, just confused.”

Mubarak stressed, “Rawlings is not the first, and would not be the last party member to express reservations over certain aspects of governance under Prof. Mills.”

This, he said, was evident in the fact that Ghana’s first President, Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, did it and went as far as describing some elements in his party as traitors, without naming them.