By Philip Tengzu, GNA
Bongberi (U/W), Jan. 30, GNA – Several women at Bongberi, a deprived community in Varemperi Electoral Area in the Wa West District, have resorted to collecting stones to fix their roads to help them access quality healthcare services in neighbouring communities.
They said the deplorable conditions of the road networks make it nearly impossible for pregnant women to visit nearby health facilities for antenatal care services.
Speaking to the Ghana News Agency last Saturday Madam Anobon Baasolo, a resident, said in order to alleviate their plight the women are adopting these steps to support the youth led by their assembly member to improve the roads.
A large group of women were seen carrying stones with head pans last week from far distances to fill in deep potholes for vehicles or tricycles to convey people to receive health services in other parts of the community.
Madam Baasolo blamed bad leadership and unpatriotic attitude of political office holders for the sorry state of their roads saying: “They only seek political power from the vulnerable electorates and later abandon them to their own fate”.
She cited situations where several pregnant women have died and others lost their babies as a result of their inability to have access to skilled delivery personnel at the only health centre in another community.
"There was a time I was due to give birth but I could not sit on a motorbike and it was in the night, my husband called a trycicle but it could not come to the community, it was packed in Lose and the men used cloth to carry me across the water to where the trycicle was, at the time we got the clinic I had lost my child", Madam Augustina, another resident said.
The women appealed to stakeholders and the government to come to their aid and fix the road network and threatened not to vote in the 2020 general elections.
Mr Gyirkaar Nicholas, the Assembly Member of the Varemperi Electoral Area, said repeated appeals to the District Assembly to fix the roads has fallen on deaf ears.
When Mr Edward Laarbiri Sabo, the Wa West District Chief Executive, was contacted, he said plans have been put in place to provide the community with better roads, but fell short of giving a time line when it would be done.
Access to road network from the Bonbgeri community to other adjoining communities in the Varemperi Electoral Area are virtually impossible as residents in this community rely on foot paths through which only motorbikes and bicycles could ply during dry season.
Residents in the community are often cut off from neighbouring towns and communities during rainy season and access to healthcare services is terminated.
Community members also told the GNA that in severe cases, one either had to be carried on the back or on a stretcher to the nearest community before a tricycle or vehicle could pull up to carry the person to a health facility.
GNA
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