The Executive Director of GHANECare, a Non-Governmental Organisation, Richard Kuunaah, has lashed out at Ghanaians for failing to protect the country’s waterbodies, giving room for illegal mining to pollute water sources.

He says “We must arise and resist the destruction of our waterbodies by illegal mining if our leaders have failed us”.

He said the lack of jobs should not be an excuse for the youth to indulge in illegal mining and other activities that are unfriendly to the environment.

‘‘As we are taking steps to protect our water sources, we must also begin to look for funds to reclaim the parcels of land that illegal miners have destroyed,'' he added.

Speaking with JoyNews at Sunyani, Mr Kuunaah recommended engaging the same youth involved in galamsey to plant trees and reclaim the degraded lands.

He further underscored the need for Ghanaians to respect nature and ensure their communities are clean and healthy.

He noted that “Growing up, our mothers always taught us to respect and keep our environment tidy, so there was nothing like dumping refuse into the gutters and that made our gutters clean”.

He said it is regrettable that some Ghanaians have now turned drains into refuse dumps while others are happy to pollute water bodies through their negative activities.

‘‘I just can’t understand why our people have deviated from practices such as farming 200 feet away from waterbodies, something our forbearers did to protect the waterbodies,” Mr Kuunaah observed.

The negative attitudes, he said, are not only destroying the environment but have posed various health risks to the citizens.

He said the country’s sanitation problems could be solved if citizens begin to respect and defend what he termed ''the rule of nature'' in all the traditional areas.

He further called on traditional councils in the country to institute mandatory communal cleaning exercises every Saturday. This action, Mr Kuunaah stressed, will make the communities tidy and citizens healthy.