World Water Day…where do we stand in the celebration?

An underground well

By Mustapha Sesay, Sierra Leone.

Water is an essential in our daily activities and a basic right for all to access it at affordable rate.

It is unfortunate that as the world continues to celebrate World Water Day, most developing countries including Sierra Leone suffer from acute water shortage to millions of its population.

The situation for the scramble of water in the major cities is similar to those in the remote areas. It is disturbing to see the plight of the masses in the dirty drainages in the city of Freetown in long lines cutting rubber pipes for drinking water. If such a situation exist in the cities them what can we say about the rural poor areas.

This is one major factor for the spread of water borne diseases like diarrhea or cholera.
In majority of the schools, there is the absence of non functional taps; this has serious effects on the education of our children as the lack of water enhances poor hygiene and sanitation facilities.

In our Universities, the situation is very deplorable as students go without pure and affordable drinking water not to mention a decent learning environment, and yet society continues to talk of a clean environment.

Well water that dries up easily

In the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, most policies are not actually implemented in these educational institutions despite the various policies and huge chunk of funds provided. It must be noted that institutions have a very high percentage of the youthful population that continue to die slowly from unhealthy environment now called educational places.

How long can such deplorable places continue to exist and allow our children to inhale these polluted environments?
In some schools, teachers boldly stand in front of the children and teach the importance of water in our daily lives, yet in the schools not a single tap or well water could be located.