Let's embrace 'Environmental Care Campaign' to save lives - Pastor Owodo

The Nyamekwagyinla District Pastor of The Church of Pentecost in Ellembelle District of the Western Region under Axim Area, Pastor David Kweku Owodo has appealed to Ghanaians to embrace the Church's Environmental Care Campaign to save lives.

He made this plead during a clean-up exercise organized at Aiyinasi Nyamebekyere towards the launch of phase two of the Church's campaign to make this country very clean.

The week-long activities helped the leadership of the Church to hold public education on sanitation, stakeholder's forum, community durbar on environmental cleanliness among others.

The Church of Pentecost, as part of its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSP), to help Ghana deal with the menace of poor sanitation which impact the economy with $290 million annual loses, instituted the "Environmental Care Campaign" as one of the community impact initiatives captured in the five-year vision policy statement of the Church dubbed "Vision 2023" under the leadership of Apostle Eric Nyamekye, Chairman of the Church.

The implementation of the environmental care campaign started in 2019 in partnership with waste management giant, Zoomlion Ghana Limited. Also encapsulated in the project are campaign for attitudinal change on bad sanitation and hygiene practices, help curb human activities that negatively impact the environment, provision of waste bins and tree planting.

According to the leadership of the Church, it observed after the implementation of the first phase of the project; the difficulty in acquiring waste bins from the District Assemblies and irregular collection of waste by some waste management firms and the penchant of littering the environment by many Ghanaians, as some major Challenges that threatened the success of the exercise hence the new strategic approach adopted for the second phase of the project.

To make the phase two of the campaign, the leadership of the church has involved the District Chief Executives, Members of Parliament, Assembly Members, Chiefs, opinion leaders, other churches and the general public to rid-off filth and indiscriminate waste disposal in Ghana.

Addressing the media after the exercise at Aiyinasi Nyamebekyere, the Pastor of Nyamekwagyinla District of the church, Ps. Kweku Owodo commended the Chairman of the Church, Apostle Eric Nyamekye and the Executive Council for introduction of the Environmental Care Campaign to save lives.

He also thanked the chiefs and people of Nyamebekyere for welcoming the campaign to make their community beautiful.

"I will take this opportunity to thank the Chairman of the church, Apostle Eric Nyamekye and the Executive Council for initiating such a laudable policy", he said acknowledged.

He disclosed that last year the Church embarked on the same campaign but said this year's campaign has been very good as compared to last year's campaign.

"Last year, the church did a clean-up campaign as part of vision 2023 and this year's campaign is very good because the Church has involved the Chiefs, DCEs, Assembly Members, Community Environmental Committees, and you can see that today the participants have increased as compared to what happened last year, they have come and I am happy", he stressed.

He said as part of this year's campaign, the Nyamekwagyinla District of the church embarked on education campaign on Monday which was followed by a stakeholder's consultation in the community.

The District Pastor admitted that sanitation issue has been one of the majority challenges facing his District but said some residents were doing well to clean their surroundings.

"In fact sanitation issue in this area is not all that good though some people are doing their best, it is becoming a behavior of some people that whenever they throw rubbish indiscriminately they don't see that sanitation is a sin", he worried.

He, therefore, said since the church has introduced this Environmental Care Campaign, the was the need for everybody to embrace it.

He assured that the campaign was not going to be a nine-day wonder but would be held every month to sustain.

"It is not going to be a nine-day wonder as I have indicated we met the Chief and his people to educate them about the need to ensure cleanliness and when we met the community agreed to deal with anybody who be littering around indiscriminately.

He advised Ghanaians to clean up their communities they found themselves in also also emphasized that it was a responsibility of every Christian to ensure cleanliness, "let us make cleanliness to be part of our daily lives".

He added that "If we clean our surroundings, it will drive away some diseases such as malaria, cholera, diarrhea among others, these diseases are killable so we shouldn't joke with cleanliness at all".

He concluded by appealing to the Ellembelle District Assembly to provide the communities with dustbins.

On his part, the Odikro of the area, Nana Kweku Obo lauded the leadership of The Church of Pentecost for the initiative.

He pledged the Community's commitment to support the campaign to sustain.

He also promised on behalf of the community to provide dustbins to support the campaign.

He, therefore seized the opportunity to warn those litter indiscriminately and emphasized that henceforth anybody caught in the act would be fined.

He also reaffirmed that the community would collaborate with the church to clean the area every month.