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WHEN THE RAINS CAME TO ACCRA – THEN AND NOW
By: Nii Nertey-Akoso Nettey
July 1st, 2026

On April 18, 1960, the Daily Graphic’s front page carried a stark headline: “WHEN THE RAINS CAME TO ACCRA.” The images showed barefoot children wading through floodwaters while vehicles sat stranded on submerged roads. At the Kwame Nkrumah Circle, traffic was held up for two and a half hours, and residents used buckets and pans to scoop water from their flooded homes. That downpour was then believed to be the heaviest rain ever recorded in the capital.

Sixty-six years later, history has been repeating itself—but with far greater intensity each time. On June 29, 2026, Accra was again brought to a standstill by torrential rains. President John Dramani Mahama described it as “one of the highest in several years,” with about 140 millimetres falling in a single day—more than double the 56-millimetre peak recorded in all of 2025. The disaster claimed at least 12 lives, left seven missing, and displaced 38,802 people across 18 municipalities. The Ghana Meteorological Agency recorded 169.2 millimetres in a single day—the fourth highest since 1995—and a monthly total of 593.2 millimetres, the highest in Ghana’s history.

President Mahama attributed the worsening floods to a triple crisis: climate change (June rainfall tripled from 85mm in 2024 to 333mm in 2026), poor drainage obstructed by rapid urban development, and human behaviour—and worst of all, indiscriminate waste dumping. The government has released GH¢300 million for relief and mitigation and ordered the demolition of all structures blocking drainage channels.

The scenes from 1960 and 2026 are hauntingly similar—but the cost in lives and livelihoods has grown exponentially. As the Daily Graphic editorial lamented: “What is extraordinary is that in 2026, our capital still collapses every time the clouds gather.” The rains keep coming, but the solutions remain as elusive as they were six decades ago.

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