Former Minister of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, Prof. Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, has attributed Ghana’s recurring flooding to years of institutional neglect and weak enforcement of land use and environmental regulations.
Speaking at the 14th Commemorative Lecture in honour of former President John Evans Atta Mills on Wednesday, July 22, Prof. Frimpong-Boateng said the floods that hit parts of the Greater Accra Region in late June and early July exposed deep-rooted governance failures rather than merely poor public attitudes towards waste disposal.
He acknowledged that discouraging residents from dumping waste into drains remains important but argued that such efforts fail to address the structural challenges driving the country’s flooding crisis.
“The floods that struck Greater Accra in the last week of June and the first week of July this year are a distressing illustration of the same institutional neglect,” he said.
“As the waters rose, I listened to politicians and opinion leaders urge residents not to dump waste into gutters and drains. This advice is well intended but evades a deeper truth.”
According to Prof. Frimpong-Boateng, Ghana lacks an effective waste management system capable of collecting refuse from communities and directing it to proper disposal, recycling or waste-to-energy facilities.
He also raised concerns over the encroachment of lands reserved for flood control and water retention, saying the situation has worsened the country’s vulnerability to flooding.
“Ghana’s own land use planning framework classifies certain areas as flood-prone and reserves them as protected open space,” he said.
“Yet, across Greater Accra, all the seven planned flood retention points in Papao, Madina, Ashiyie, Adjiringanor, two in Ashaley Botwe, University Farms, and Ashaiman have all been encroached upon.”
The former minister further noted that buffer zones along waterways and other protected lands have increasingly been taken over by unauthorised developments despite the existence of state institutions mandated to protect them.
He cited developments within Ramsar-protected wetlands as evidence of what he described as failures in environmental governance.
“On the western edge of Accra is a cement factory built in a Ramsar-protected wetland. The factory was sanctioned by the MP, the Chiefs, MMDCEs, residents, and the seat of government itself because it was classified as part of 1D1F in the Ramsar wetland,” he said.
Prof. Frimpong-Boateng warned that Ghana’s inability to enforce environmental laws threatens its long-term development goals.
“A nation that cannot summon the discipline to manage its waste and protect its wetlands cannot, by any stretch of imagination, undertake the disciplined, sustained project of national development that Professor Mills envisioned,” he said.
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