Accra 16 March 2018—The Canadian government who was the main donor of WASH DPC Project has expressed its satisfaction for the way the initiative was executed.

In a post project interview in Accra, the First Secretary (Development) at the Canadian High Commission Francis Bedros was however convinced that the project would have done with more visibility, an aspect he says was not explored to its fullest.

“We were moved to act to after we saw the devastating floods that affected a huge swathe of the country. We set out to help some 265 communities whose lives had been hugely affected by the catastrophe,” he said.

According to the diplomat, some of the hurdles faced at the beginning were delays in kicking off as well as the high objectives which the project sought to achieve. To mitigate the effects of the floods, the project managed to build resilient infrastructure as well as coming up with disaster management plans,” he said.

Mr. Bedros is also impressed with the unity of purpose exhibited by the four UN agencies involved in the project. He says the point of contact into the UN that UN-Habitat provided proved to be the all-important link that was needed to push the project forward. After the few hitches at the beginning the project went on smoothly with timely monthly reports being submitted, he said.

According to the First Secretary, the formation of a steering committee at the national level and the meetings with local authorities at the field level helped to smoothen things. “Ghanaian authorities were impressed because this project addressed a real need. The four UN agencies were in contact with the government and the NAMDO was heavily involved in the project,” he said.

He said the donor’s initial fears over the strength of the infrastructure were allayed with time since the flood control measures have proved resilient enough. “We needed the communities’ nuy in and we managed to get it and the district assemblies were really hands-on,” he said.

This was the first Delivering As One project Canada was doing in Ghana and the results were encouraging meaning that the donor might be interested in a similar venture in the future. The project had seen improved sanitation at the household level.

“It is usually very difficult for poor households to save up and build flood resilient latrines and this is one vulnerable group we deliberately sought to help out,” he said.

However, Mr. Bedros said the communications aspect of the project was not well executed. “A project of this magnitude requires a good communication strategy from the beginning to the end because communications is a crucial component of an undertaking of such magnitude,” he said.