We No Longer Quarrel With Our Wives...

Mr. Isaac Owusu, Mankralo of Abutia Traditional Area, has said petty quarrels between husbands and wives in the community over serving of food late had stopped after USAID and Rotary International through Ghana Wash provided the community with a borehole. �We no longer quarrel with our wives for serving food late because they don�t walk long distances searching for water and now prepare our food on time,� he said. Mr Owusu said this during a tour by Mr James Bever, USAID-Ghana Mission Director, to some USAID partly sponsored water and sanitation projects in the community. The farming community, some 13 kilometres from Ho with a population of about 6,000, until 2011 depended on groundwater and streams for drinking water with women and children walking long distances to fetch water for domestic use. Mr Owusu said the facility had brought happiness to the community, coming with enhanced sanitation conditions. He said over the past two years when the community started using the facilities, sanitation related diseases reduced drastically that enabled families to save enough money for the education of their children. He said it had also improved pupils� punctuality at school and commended the benefactors for the support. Mr Owusu said the community, through its own initiative, expanded the water system to serve some surrounding communities and also built 13 public stand pipes at Abutia-Teti. Mankralo Owusu said the facility was also extended to 28 households with 13 of them using it for water closets. Mr Bever said he was happy the facility brought happiness to families and reunited husbands and wives. �We know that if the children are happy, women will be happy and if women are happy men will be happy,� he said. Mr Bever commended the community for the efficient management of the water system and urged the managers to extend it to every home. USAID, in an alliance with Rotary International under the Water and Sanitation (WATSAN) project, provided mechanized water systems, boreholes with hand pumps and toilet facilities in 12 basic schools, a health post and a market/lorry park in the Volta Region including the Abutia project. The two institutions contributed $2 million towards WATSAN projects in 114 communities, providing improved sanitation for more than 84,000 people in Volta, Eastern, Central and Greater Accra regions.