Interior Minister Mohammed Muntaka Mubarak has apologised on behalf of government to Ghanaians following the devastating floods that claimed nine lives and destroyed homes and property after Monday\u2019s torrential rains.<\/p>\n
Speaking on JoyNews\u2019\u00a0PM Express<\/em>, the Asawase MP acknowledged the pain caused by the disaster and admitted that government could have done more, but insisted officials had been working through the night as the crisis unfolded.<\/p>\n \u201cYes, we are really very sorry for the loss of life. We are sorry that this thing has really devastated Accra,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He defended the government\u2019s response, arguing that while the country had advance warnings that June and July would bring heavy rains, the specific alert for Monday\u2019s downpour only came late on Sunday night.<\/p>\n \u201cBut if you ask the Meteo person, he did not say that it\u2019s going to rain today. Ask him, when did they give us the actual alert that this will happen? Yesterday (Sunday, June 28), at 11 pm when the majority of Ghanaians were asleep,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Muntaka disclosed that one of the immediate steps taken was to coordinate with the Minister for Communication, Digital Technology and Innovation to get emergency messages sent to mobile phone users.<\/p>\n \u201cI called him, I said that look, you need to help us, can you get the telcos to send messages to people? He was very swift. I believe that is the thing that we need to be doing,\u201d he said, thanking Sam George for the prompt response.<\/p>\n The Interior Minister also revealed that discussions had begun at the Presidency to improve coordination among ministries ahead of future emergencies.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve spoken to the Secretary to the President. We\u2019ve agreed that as the Secretary to the President, he will be able to pull all of us as ministers together to come and sit down and make sure that we prepare ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n He stressed, however, that Ghana\u2019s limited resources remained a major challenge in responding to disasters of such magnitude.<\/p>\n \u201cThis country is not a rich country, where we have shelters so we can collect people and go and put them there. This country is not that rich. Let\u2019s not be running away from actual responsibility and facing the reality.\u201d<\/p>\n While conceding that more could be done, Muntaka rejected suggestions that government officials had been complacent.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, yes, I agree, we could do more, but let\u2019s not make it look like all politicians are people who are not thinking about the country. They are just thinking about themselves. They put them in positions; they are not proactive.\u201d<\/p>\n He said he remained awake throughout the night monitoring developments and was in constant contact with President John Mahama.<\/p>\n \u201cI can bet you, we didn\u2019t sleep; I didn\u2019t sleep, and I know the time that I had to speak to the President early in the morning. I woke him up, and he\u2019s been up and asking questions almost throughout, and he went around to see so.\u201d<\/p>\n Muntaka maintained that the scale of Monday\u2019s rainfall meant flooding was almost unavoidable.<\/p>\n \u201cThe only way this rain today could have been avoided from going into people\u2019s homes was to lump the whole of Accra as a drain, because you can see it from the aerial view,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Interior Minister Mohammed Muntaka Mubarak has apologised on behalf of government to Ghanaians following the devastating floods that claimed nine lives and destroyed homes and property after Monday\u2019s torrential rains. Speaking on JoyNews\u2019\u00a0PM Express, the Asawase MP acknowledged the pain caused by the disaster and admitted that government could have done more, but insisted officials […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":123457,"featured_media":17017,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[4983],"class_list":["post-17016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general-news","tag-mohammed-muntaka-mubarak"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/123457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17016"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17018,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17016\/revisions\/17018"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Disclaimer: The content provided on Fish FM Online is for informational and entertainment purposes only. While we strive for accuracy, we do not guarantee the completeness, reliability, or timeliness of the information presented. Fish FM Online and its affiliates are not responsible for any errors or omissions, nor for any decisions made based on the content available on our platform.<\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"