CEO of Olympics, Mr Ato Coleman and Mr George Cobinna Yorke at the ceremony
Premier League side,Accra Great Olympics, have signed an agreement with WaterAid Ghana, an NGO, to use football as a tool in fighting the spread of COVID-19 within the coastal areas in Accra.
The partnership will see Olympics using its community presence and popularity of players, legends, supporters, and management members of the club together with WaterAid to conduct outreach programmes in the selected coastal areas within Accra to propagate the need to comply with the COVID-19 protocols.
At the signing ceremony in Accra yesterday, the deputy CEO of Olympics, Mr Ato Coleman, described the partnership as the best especially when majority of the club’s support base emanates from the coastal areas of Accra.
He explained that using the passion of the nation as a tool to help fight the spread of COVID-19 was worth celebrating and expressed the readiness of Olympics to help propagate the dangers of not adhering to the protocols.
“The decision to bring these two entities together towards fighting this pandemic should be lauded because propagating the need to adhere to the COVID-19 protocols should be a priority especially in the coastal areas of Accra where our core supporters come from.
The Head of Policy, Advocacy and Campaign at WaterAid Ghana, Mr George Cobinna Yorke, said his outfit was committed to using football as a social mobilisation tool towards educating the people within the coastal vicinity in Accra.
“We are glad to have Great Olympics on board in our push to get the education on COVID-19 adherence through to the coastal areas in Accra. The focus is to spread it across the other clubs going forward and we believe that could be achieved,” he noted.
Mr Yaw Attah Arhin, chairman of Coalition of NGO’s in Water and Sanitation, lauded the decision of the two bodies to collaborate to help fight behavoural change in areas where it is difficult to comply with the COVID-19 protocols.
For his part, the chairman of the Ghana League Clubs Association (GHALCA), Mr Kudjoe Fianoo, thanked Olympics for being the pacesetters in the trumpeting of the need to adhere to COVID-19 protocols especially in communities where they have their support base.
Mr Fianoo, who is also an Executive Director of Olympics, said WaterAid’s decision to partner Olympics through football was going to achieve great success especially when the sport is loved by all Ghanaians.
