The Environmental office of the Obuasi Municipal Assembly has started a campaign dubbed “Name, shame, sanction” campaign.
The campaign is to raise awareness on the need to keep the environment clean after the increasing rise in sanitation problems in the Municipality.
During this campaign, the environmental officers move with media team from Obuasi to identify places in the city especially chop bars and filling station where environmental laws are flouted. The offending operators are arrested and penalised.
The campaign is also intended to assist the Obuasi Municipal Assembly to enforce sanitation bye-laws and raise awareness about the need to keep the environment clean.
Briefing the media after the first round of the exercise, the Municipal Environmental Health Officer, Fuseina Imoro, said the rationale behind the exercise was to follow up on a feedback from the general public about the unsanitary conditions at some chop bars in Obuasi.
“We decided to involve the media in this exercise to serve as a deterrent to those who constantly flout our laws with impunity. We have had a lot of complaints from the general public and our officers on the ground, so this time around we decided to involve the media to name and shame offenders,” Miss Imoro added.
She said as part of the exercise, they issued abatement notice to those who had violated environmental laws to afford them the time and space to correct their wrongs.
She emphasized that her office will do a follow-up to ascertain whether the anomalies detected have been corrected.
“When we come back and see things are the same, we will process offenders for court,” she warned.
She said the Assembly has resolved to enforce its environmental bye-laws to ensure full compliance in a bid to keep the environment clean.
The Municipal Prosecutor, Richmond Adam Brown, has revealed that the current Public Health laws are punitive and deterrent enough.
He added that strict enforcement of it will help keep the city clean.
“The bye-laws and the criminal offences act were not deterrent enough but the introduction of the Public Health Laws 2012 Act 851 has given us hope that we can fight to keep our environment clean and safe since it contains punitive actions to deal with offenders.”
He added that the Assembly has taken into consideration the process involved in the enforcement of environmental laws hence has decided to first give verbal education and abatement notice to offenders.
He stressed that, they will follow it up with court actions if nothing has been done about the situation.
Mr. Brown called for the support and cooperation of the people Obuasi to enable to enable the office keep the environment clean.