The Ghana Red Cross Society (GRCS) in the Upper East Region has organised a durbar at Doba, a community in the Kassena-Nankana Municipality in of the Region to mark this year’s International Day for Disaster Reduction.
The durbar, organised with support from the Swiss Red Cross Society, was intended to sensitise the citizenry on the need to build strong houses and plant trees around them to prevent the effects of floods in communities in the Region.
This year’s International Day of Disaster Reduction was on the theme: “Reduce disaster damage to critical infrastructure and disruption of basic services.”
The Day focused on efforts, members of the public and communities around the world kept in place to reduce their exposure to disasters and the importance of reducing the risks they faced.
The Swiss Red Cross Society is implementing the Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) in Kassena-Nankana Municipality, the Nabdam, Bongo and Binduri Districts of the Region, which would build the capacities of citizens and equip them with tools to respond to emergencies in their communities.
Addressing the durbar, Mr Paul Wooma, the Upper East Regional Director of the GRCS called on government to pay critical attention to the construction of schools and Community-Based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) compounds to ensure they were built to withstand the dangers of flooding and windstorm.
“If any school is to be built, it must be built well to withstand floods, winds torm and any form of natural disaster,” he emphasised.
Mr David Mba, the Upper East Deputy Regional Director of the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), noted that the Region had experienced continuous rainfall for about a week with floods in some parts of the area.
He said the recent rains led to “Houses being destroyed, with others partially collapsed, some collapsed, people have lost their lives,” and disclosed that per the current records available to his outfit, the Navrongo Municipality had lost two lives.
Mr Mba said the Regional NADMO was yet to compile the records about the state of deaths in the Region, and appealed to the GRCS to support NADMO with the needed logistics to help affected communities.
As part of activities to commemorate the day, a tree was planted at the Doba Chief’s Palace to signify and create awareness of community members on the importance to plant trees around their houses.
The International Day of Disaster Reduction is celebrated annually on October 13
