SCRAP BUSINESS CAUSING HAVOC IN TEMA (NOV 28, PAGE 18)

What started like scrap business is gradually becoming a health hazard and a security risk to people in Tema and Ashaiman.
Drains, available spaces and streets are now being used as dumping grounds for scraps after the private scrap dealers have collected them from house to house.
It is common to see young men with push carts shouting out to residents for scraps, and other discarded plastics and metals.
Some of these items are discarded computers, car parts, vehicle tyres, fridges, car bodies, cooking pots, gas and electric cookers and cut pieces of abandoned vessels along the beaches.
The cart pushers, after gathering the scrap, dump them at selected sites before conveying them to their final destination in Ashaiman. Also before conveying the scraps to the main site at Ashaiman, the scrap dealers segregate them into grades such as aluminium, steel, cast, iron, plastics, etc. and abandon the left-overs thus creating dirt and filth.
Some residents whose houses are near the dumping grounds said all efforts to get the private scrap dealers to clear them have proved futile.
They claimed that the scraps now served as mosquito breeding grounds and hiding places for reptiles and other dangerous creatures.
Some of the most affected residents have appealed to the Environmental Department of the Tema Metropolitan Assembly to exercise its control over this growing canker.
During her rounds the Correspondent of the Daily Graphic found out that the main big drain in which water from parts of Community Seven, the whole of Communities Eight and Nine flow through to Community 10 into the Sakumo Lagoon before entering the sea, is one of the main scraps dumping points.
There is always someone standing-by at the dumping site to receive items from individuals who have something to sell.
Because of the nature of the scraps, they pose serious danger to vehicle tyres as the pointed material easily puncture them, and pedestrians have to be careful when using those areas to avoid being injured.
During rains some of the scraps are washed down the drains.
It was gathered that previously when the steel industry was booming, scrap dealers from other parts of the country, especially the Suame Magazine, came to Tema with loads of scraps for export and to sell to the steel industries.
According to the sources, at a certain time the business became more lucrative when financiers in the business quoted high rates which the local industries were unable to afford.
This, the reporter gathered, attracted many redundant youth into the scrap business who worked for big time people.
The source said to be able to present the expected quality material for sale to the big players in the business the truck pushers had to dump at selected places to enable them to select what they needed.
It was also gathered that the dumping grounds were operated by scrap dealers from Accra who dumped and waited for vehicles from Accra to convey the days consignment of scraps to various destinations.
Some people the Daily Graphic spoke to were not happy with the activities of the scrap dealers because apart from the environmental hazards, some of the scrap dealers went round looking for steel and plastic materials left in the backyards of houses.
Refuse containers, metal covers on drains, sign posts and steel pots used by food vendors in preparing their food are picked up by the scrap dealers.
A trader at Tema Community Nine, Madam Adjoa Pokua, claimed that some scrap dealers once sneaked into her house and stole her money container and gas cooker which had been left outside the house after she had undertaken a house cleaning exercise in her house.
Some of the scrap dealers the Daily Graphic spoke to denied that they were spies but accepted that they were creating filth where they dumped the scraps.
Their concern was the money they expect to make from the business and as such they give no thought to the negative impact their activities have on their own health and the community in general.
Another question that came up was if they paid taxes on the business which involves exporting the scrap to earn foreign currency.
Some suggestions that came up were that the TMA should register the scrap dealers, find them a convenient place to dump their scraps and make them pay the necessary fees.
The assemblymember in whose community the drain is, Mr Alex Owusu Asare, noted that he had reported the conduct of the scrap dealers to the assembly’s task force but was told that the dealers had been warned to quit on two occasions.
Attempts to seek the side of officials of the metropolitan administration failed but Mr Asare confirmed that the activities of the scrap dealers were known to the assembly .