Sierra Leone Journal, October 2006
David Crosweller of Wherever the Need has recently returned from a visit to our major project in the village of Gbongay (pronounced ‘Bongay’) in Sierra Leone. The following is his journal.
Having arrived late on the Monday night, the next morning we were met at our hotel first thing by Senesi Fawundu who is our co-ordinator in Sierra Leone. On this trip I was accompanied by Dominic Brouard and Tara Cody, both students studying film at the University of Wales, who were documenting the visit in order to create a video of our work.
We covered the 200 miles from Freetown to Bo, Sierra Leone’s second city, in about eight hours. The road is bad and the vehicle took a terrible pounding – although it was to get worse! Our aching bodies were pleased to step from the car for the last time that day and enter our hotel, which was a step up from the previous place I had stayed, having both water and electricity, albeit the latter thanks to an overnight generator.
On the Wednesday morning we left early for our first stop, the Paul School for the Blind in Bo.
Paul Trye is a former woodwork teacher who went blind twenty years ago. He decided he would start a school and set about raising the funds to acquire land and construct buildings. On my first visit to Gbongay I noticed a young man, Momoh Fawah, who was blind and felt he was suffering an unnecessary hardship by being cut off from any kind of educational facilities that would improve his chances in life.
WTN paid the £160 it would cost to send him to the school, and the annual running cost will be a little over £100. He is one of only four children (of the thirty-six boys and eighteen girls) who actually contribute to the running costs of the school. Momoh told me he was very happy to be at the school and we all agreed he had a far better opportunity in providing for himself in later life by receiving a good education and some form of vocational training, which is also provided by the school.
The school itself is a sprawling mess of buildings that are separated into a school facility, dormitories, kitchen and sleeping quarters for teachers and Paul Trye. Of these, the school is in the best state of repair, although as with most buildings the roof leaks in the rainy season.
The dormitories are cramped and dark, the kitchen is a covered area where meals are cooked on open fires – one dreads to think about food hygiene – and Paul’s bedroom doubles up as an office. There is a toilet of sorts and the whole school is run on less than a shoestring.
Although such projects are not our focus, it would be very nice to uplift the whole structure of the school. New dormitories, kitchen and toilets are all crucially needed, and should anyone show an interest WTN would arrange for all the necessary quotes to be drawn up.
From the Blind School we drove to Gbongay. The rainy season had made the roads far worse than on my previous visit. We made our way to Pejeh Chiefdom and our first stop was to the Paramount Chief, a fierce looking woman who gives the impression that she rules with an iron fist. She is head of the thirteen Chiefs in Pejeh. One has to go through certain customary routines and until these are done things always seem a little uneasy, but they eased once I produced the photos and present from Europe I had promised her.
She asked Senesi why things were being done in Gbongay and not in her village and it was explained that the aim was to work throughout the Chiefdom and that at some time new facilities would be made available to her village as well.We left the Paramount Chief and headed for Gbongay.
I had already warned Dom and Tara to have their cameras ready because I was pretty sure that it would all kick off once the car was parked up. The villagers did not disappoint. There was a lot of dancing and singing, I was hugged by complete strangers and had to shake hands with anyone who was in front of me. It is difficult to convey the atmosphere, but I can assure you it is unlike anything one would normally experience.
To recap on the project, WTN was to replace the two hand pumps that were stolen in the war, install a generator and overhead tank, build eco-sanitation toilets, construct a carpentry and storage unit, and start a bee keeping livelihood programme. The first hand pump had been replaced and the beekeeping programme started with the construction of thirty five hives and relevant training.
The second stage, which is being undertaken now, consists of another hand pump, a platform on which two 3,000 litre tanks will be placed, a diesel generator to pump water to the tanks, and the completion of more hives. The final stage will include at least one 20,000 litre rain water harvesting tank and two eco-sanitation toilets, each with sixteen cubicles.
Originally we were going to install a solar powered generator, but the longer term plan includes the introduction of a Jatropha cultivation programme. Jatropha is a high yield plant that produces bio-fuel, which is emissions-free and works in most diesel engines; the generator, when not pumping water, could be used to provide electricity for the school and community centre. I was extremely pleased with the progress and especially with the attitude of the villagers who really want to use these new facilities to help themselves and their families.
After we all walked around the village looking at the completed and partially finished work, we visited the closest hives that had bees darting in and out. I didn’t get too close to this part of the project, but Dom and Tara donned the protective suits and got up close and personal with the bees! The first harvest will be complete by the end of October. It is a great success.
It was then time for speeches, which mercifully did not last too long. When it came to my turn I reinforced the fact that we would provide the building blocks to help the villagers create a new life for themselves, but they had to put in the effort.
Lunchtime followed and then an amazing football match between the Arsenal Bees and another team, with all the players coming from Gbongay and the next three villages that have been identified as needing help. I won’t list a whole description of the events, except to say that it was played in atrocious conditions on a pitch that was no better than an unkempt field. The players gave their all in a game that was full of incident and the Bees eventually ran out winners 4-2.
The next day we were to see three villages in the same Chiefdom, Pejeh, and one in the adjacent Chiefdom, Soaa. Each village had similar needs and they all asked for the same basic help. This was for water, sanitation, livelihood, a new school building and help with new housing.
One asked for washing/shower facilities and one for animal husbandry. They all wanted new community centres. I repeated the same message of us providing the building blocks and their effort completing the programme.
To give a brief mention of each of the villages: Koiva (pronounced ‘Queeva’) has a population of 875 people, has two schools, one quite decent, 350 school children (from the surrounding area as well) and seven teachers; Hellabu has a population of 1,700 people with 255 schoolchildren and five teachers; and Njagbema (pronounced ‘Jabema’) where there are 400 people and the children go to school in Gbongay.
The final village was Kobeibu, but as we arrived it was getting dark and despite the fantastic reception we could not stay long due to us wanting to get on to a ‘proper’ road before night enveloped us.
This despite the fact the village presented me with a goat! I will recount one incident of our journey to Njagbema. The village is only a twenty five minute walk from Gbongay through the forest, but about five miles from the road. The best way to describe this road is a poor bridle path. The car was a low-lying and very old Mercedes, and you could actually hear the overgrown bush grass and soil scrapping the bottom. As we lurched from pot hole to ditch the rear axle took a battering. However, the most difficult part of the journey was when we crossed two ‘palm tree’ bridges.
These bridges are made from the trunks of palm trees and laid across brook or stream and are designed for people and carts, not a two tonne car. We crossed the first one with great difficulty and we feared that this would not support a return journey.
We approached the return trip with some trepidation and the village chief sent some young men ahead of us to make sure that if we encountered a problem they would be on hand to help. We crossed the bridge after several attempts and continued on our way, sliding across the path from time to time and fearing that there would be one jolt into a ditch too many. Fortunately we made the journey back to the road and our journey home continued.
The return journey to Freetown was started early on the Friday morning as we had a meeting with a relative of Senesi, who is the Deputy Finance Minister. I asked him about the G8 debt relief programme and asked whether there had been any benefits to Sierra Leone. He answered simply - “no!” He then told us that of the US$150 million that was at the disposal of the Government – the entire budget – 20%, US$30 million, immediately went on interest repayments. To his credit he did say there were processes underway that could mean debt relief may happen by sometime early next year. He told us a lot more besides, but this is not the place to discuss such things.
Finally I would like to tell a short story. Driving back from Gbongay after the football match I remarked how happy the people were. Oh yes, my hosts agreed, water and the possibility of a brighter future has given them much optimism. Then they said, “…and of course, no children have died.” I asked them what they meant and they told me that until the new pump had been installed on average one baby/small child dies every two weeks because of polluted water causing serious illness. I was stunned. Sometimes you forget what benefits clean water bring.
Overall this was a fantastic trip and I am really pleased with the way things are progressing. There is so much work we can do in Sierra Leone and we have the makings of an excellent infrastructure, and I am confident that this will grow with time.
Click here for updates of our work in Sierra Leone
• May 2006
• October 2006