Meeting to Recap - Commitment

We met yesterday at the PCG HQ in the OSU part of Accra located on the street Kukuhill Circle.

At the meeting were Teiko, Rev Amfo-Akonnor, Rev Asante, Regina, Rose, Michael, Chalmers, Rev Daniel Opong-Wereko, and Rev Samuel Nyampong.  Rev Nyampong attend Clean Water U over 10 years ago and is a big supporter as well as engaged in what LWW is doing in Ghana.  Rev Nyampong was clerk of the PCG for many years, as well.  Rev Opong-Wereko was Director of Development and Social Services prior to Rev Asante.  I met Daniel on my first trip to Ghana.

Commitment

We spoke for a long time about the attributes that make an excellent site excellent, a good site good, and then sites that aren’t in either group yet.  The attribute that we continued to circle back to was “commitment”.

The Ghanian group helped us understand that for 100s of years West Africa has been used to other nations bringing/giving to West Africa everything from the Volta Lake Dam to highways to buildings to hospitals/clinics to schools to water systems to money!  The Dutch, Germans, French, United Kingdom, United States, China, Japan, and so on.

The problem with this 100s of years of “gifting” is two fold 1) almost most of the time its what the “gifter” wants to see and not necessarily what West Africa can use effectively; and 2) there is typically no provision for sustainability.

Our commitment discussions centered getting key stake holders (my term) engaged and committed before and early with the water treatment system and health education.  LWW process is to get the admin (of the location, i.e. headmaster, general manager, pastor, etc.) committed along with the site having a water committee.  These committed groups are great for sites up to a certain size.  However, for the larger schools, like the Sr Presby schools, there needs to other groups committed.

Rev Amfo-Akonnor (Kofi) told a story about the Presby school in Koforidua where the PTA (Parents Teacher Association) has been led by the same man for over 15 years.  The school administration and the PTA do not want to see a change in leadership because the man makes the PTA work and the PTA makes the school work.  Point is - even though these larger Presby schools are boarding schools, the parents need to be engaged and committed to a primary requirement of treated water.

Another group that needs to be committed in the larger Presby schools are groups like maintenance, science department, etc.  Maintenance is clear (sort of).  Although the LWW system is maintained by the trained operators who have direct access to Michael - the system depends on raw water flow and electricity.  The schools don’t always have the best processes and urgency when electricity goes out or raw water flow is interrupted or priorities for raw water flow.  Anum lost 75% of its raw water flow to the campus - the action was for the school to repipe the remaining raw water flow to the boys wash room - every other need was “dry”.

The Ghanaian group is going to work on expanding the site selection process to include going deeper past the Presby school’s administration and water committee.