The Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL) has announced that it will embark on an exercise to change all faulty and worn-out machines at the Dalun Water Treatment Plant to improve the water supply system in the Tamale Metropolis of the Northern Region.
According to GWCL, this is part of short-term measures to solve the water crisis in the Tamale Metropolis.
The northern regional capital has been experiencing a perennial water crisis for two years now.
The situation gets worse during the dry season, with residents either traveling several kilometers to access mostly unsafe water for domestic use or buying water from private water suppliers at exorbitant prices.
The company blames their inability to supply water to many parts of the city on population growth, frequent power outages, and old and worn-out machines at the treatment plant, which affect the production of water at full capacity.
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Head of Corporate Affairs at GWCL, Stanley Martey, told journalists in Tamale on Wednesday, May 7, that replacing the worn-out machines will scale up production while efforts are made to permanently resolve the water crisis in the regional capital.
He said as part of the long-term measures, the government is working assiduously to commence the Tamale Water Expansion project to find a lasting solution to the water crisis.
Mr. Martey said, “Because of the old nature of the treatment plant, we’re able to produce somewhere around 8 million gallons of water daily.
The demand for water within the Tamale Metropolis is around 27 million gallons of water daily, so there’s a serious deficit; we’re only able to supply about 30 percent of the population.
So it’s essential that the treatment plant is expanded. But in the interim, we’ll put in a short- to medium-term measure. What we’ll do is to change the pumps at the Dalun Treatment Plant while we’re working on building a new treatment plant.”
The Minister of Water Resources, Kenneth Gilbert Adjei, paid a working visit to the region and paid a courtesy call on the Overlord of Dagbon, Ndan Ya Naa Abukari II, at the Gbewaa Palace in Yendi, where he reassured the King of the NDC government’s commitment to addressing the water crisis in the Tamale Metropolis and Yendi Municipality.
He said that the Tamale and Yendi Water projects were important promises of President Mahama, disclosing that the president has tasked him to do everything possible to permanently resolve the situation.
“During the campaigns, he mentioned that before his tenure ends, the water issues are going to be resolved, and I’m here to reiterate on his behalf that it will definitely be done before His Excellency’s tenure ends,” the minister said.
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He added that they are undertaking the necessary preparations and stakeholder engagements to ensure that when work commences on the project, it will be executed differently from previous instances. Specifically, they are committed to starting the project and seeing it through to completion without delays.
Ndan Ya Naa Abukari II commended the government for making the Tamale and Yendi Water project a priority.
He said, “To get the projects started early enough is what we are all praying for”, adding that the plan to source water from the White Volta for the southern part of Tamale “will take the burden off Dalun.”
