The Rains Are Coming, Let’s Get Ready To Die

The loss of human lives and property in Accra and other parts of the country during the rainy season has become an annual ritual and we at The Thunder are no Prophets of Doom but if nothing new is done about the situation, them some better start getting ready to lose property and die.

The causes of the flooding in many parts of Ghana’s capital, Accra and some parts of the country are largely manmade and known.

The solutions to these manmade challenges are also known.

Yet very little has been done to put a stop to the causes or find a lasting solution to them.

Day in, day out, we continue to build in water ways, our contractors continue to build shallow drainage systems, citizens continue to dump refuse into open drains, people continue to use gutters and dumping grounds, people simply do not see the need to clear chocked drains in front of their houses and properties….we simply seem unperturbed about the causes of these floods.

We wait for that time of the year, we suffer the floods, we wail, our media goes on a full blaze reportage of what the problems are and why they should be solved, we wipe our tears, continue to do the same things that led to the floods, and wait for the next season of rains to repeat the cycle.

The Thunder would not blame leadership for this. It is simply an attitudinal problem.

It is more of an indiscipline issue than an issue of law enforcement.

If we are expecting the Town Council officials to move from house to house, community to community, forcing residents to clear their chocked gutters, how can leadership be blamed for this?

It is not uncommon to find in many parts of the country that once the clouds gather and start to rain, people would carry all sizes of piled up refuse from their homes and just dump them into the gutters.

Once the rain water can wash it away from where it was dumped, no one cares where it ends. How can we blame leadership for this? Unless we want policemen to move out from their duty posts and to lay wait I front of houses any time the clouds start to gather.

It is human beings that builds on water ways. It is human beings that give permit to such developers. It is human beings who go ahead and give electricity meters, water meters and other utility services to such irresponsible builders.

We have become reckless to an extent that we simply have lost our common senses of responsibility.

As the rainy season approaches one again, we would just wait and count the bodies because for years and years and years, our collective irresponsibility has left us wailing and mourning…This year would not be any different.