ECJ EUROPEAN Cleaning Journal

Pupils in a Ghanan suburb are playing truant because their school has no toilet facilities. In fact the entire community of Sankor has only one block of public loos - and just five per cent of households in the village have a toilet at home.

Sankor, on the south coast of Ghana, is a fishing village comprising 2,000 residents. Schoolchildren are forced to travel long distances to attend the call of nature at the seashore - and the journey is so long that by the time they complete the return trip, they are too late for school.

Local resident Madam Ghartey said the situation was affecting the village children's education. "The only public toilet in the community has three seats for men and same for women - and the pressure on them is simply unimaginable," she said. "Children have to defecate in polythene bags in the night because they cannot go to the seashore."

She appealed to the authorities to provide the community with additional toilet facilities.

Municipal chief executive for the Efutu Municipality Nii Ephraim shared the concern of the Sankor residents. However, he says the best solution is for home-owners to obey the by-laws which obliges them to provide toilets in their houses.