Mr. Adaboo Azeem, Director, GII
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24th October, 2011
GII Calls For Law To Regulate Water Sector
The Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII) has called for a strong legislation regime in the country’s water sector.
It said this had became necessary because the sector as of now, was fraught with corruption.
GII said that in view of the current weak legislation regime, “corruption has become too much in the water sector”, and added that stronger laws were required to deal with the situation, noting that the country did not have a specific law on water.
Results of its National Water Supply Integrity Study show the existence of corruption and this involve high ranking government officials and technicians from water companies who are involve in illegal water connections.
At a media sensitisation workshop to brief journalists on the findings of the study, the Director of GII, Mr. Vitus Azeem, said the sector was faced with bribery and petty corruption, including meter tampering, illegal connection fees and a single contractor buying and pricing all bidding documents, among others.
He said there had been some reported practices where a number of contracts were awarded to the same contractor under different names, over-invoicing, poor contract management and shoddy work through the use of poor quality materials.
In view of these, he said, there was the need to streamline and strengthen anti-corruption tools and the capacity of sector agencies to implement them.
“There is also the need for donors to introduce anti-corruption clauses in all co-operation agreements, train their own staff or local staff to put these policies into practice, and communicate on related activities and progress made,” he said.
Mr. Azeem also underscored the need to strengthen complaint mechanisms for users and provide adequate whistle-blowing protection to promote meaningful citizens participation in the development process.
Touching on the issue of investment, he said the country had the resources to raise the 1.49 billion dollars needed to expand water supply to meet the demand by 2020, instead of relying on donor support.
He said that donor support, which was about 90 per cent, was not the right approach to solving Ghana’s water supply problem, noting that “there are various areas we can explore, including taxes.”
Mr.Azeem said although investment in the sector was growing, without improved efficiencies in implementation, of water policies, the increase in funding would not be sufficient to meet the Millennium Development Goals.
He also stressed the need to overcome the high level of inequity in water services in terms of access and the price-users supply.
It said this had became necessary because the sector as of now, was fraught with corruption.
GII said that in view of the current weak legislation regime, “corruption has become too much in the water sector”, and added that stronger laws were required to deal with the situation, noting that the country did not have a specific law on water.
Results of its National Water Supply Integrity Study show the existence of corruption and this involve high ranking government officials and technicians from water companies who are involve in illegal water connections.
At a media sensitisation workshop to brief journalists on the findings of the study, the Director of GII, Mr. Vitus Azeem, said the sector was faced with bribery and petty corruption, including meter tampering, illegal connection fees and a single contractor buying and pricing all bidding documents, among others.
He said there had been some reported practices where a number of contracts were awarded to the same contractor under different names, over-invoicing, poor contract management and shoddy work through the use of poor quality materials.
In view of these, he said, there was the need to streamline and strengthen anti-corruption tools and the capacity of sector agencies to implement them.
“There is also the need for donors to introduce anti-corruption clauses in all co-operation agreements, train their own staff or local staff to put these policies into practice, and communicate on related activities and progress made,” he said.
Mr. Azeem also underscored the need to strengthen complaint mechanisms for users and provide adequate whistle-blowing protection to promote meaningful citizens participation in the development process.
Touching on the issue of investment, he said the country had the resources to raise the 1.49 billion dollars needed to expand water supply to meet the demand by 2020, instead of relying on donor support.
He said that donor support, which was about 90 per cent, was not the right approach to solving Ghana’s water supply problem, noting that “there are various areas we can explore, including taxes.”
Mr.Azeem said although investment in the sector was growing, without improved efficiencies in implementation, of water policies, the increase in funding would not be sufficient to meet the Millennium Development Goals.
He also stressed the need to overcome the high level of inequity in water services in terms of access and the price-users supply.
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