Minister of Water Resources, Ing. Philip Karimu Lansana, says a three-prong approach including community partnership is needed to be put in place to solve the issue of inadequate water supply to the Aberdeen community in the West of Freetown.

The Minister led a tour of the Aberdeen community on Thursday 2nd June 2022 to assess the water supply situation and come up with measures to resolve the issue of poor water supply to some sections of the community.

Minister Lansana was accompanied by senior officials of the Ministry of Water Resources, a cross section of management staff of the Guma Valley Water Company, Hon. Mohamed Rahman Sheriff-Coker, Councillor Ahmed Karim Bangura and other stakeholders in the Aberdeen Community.

The Minister, who spoke with this medium following the tour, said that he was invited by Hon. Sheriff Coker and other Stakeholders to get first-hand information about the water supply situation in the Aberdeen community.

Ing. Lansana said that community members should partner with Guma to monitor the valve regulation activities to ensure that valves are opened and closed at the scheduled times. “Valves that were supposed to be opened at Nylander, Kincardine and Ibo Streets were closed resulting in residents not receiving water supply for days and weeks on end; the moment we opened the valves, water started flowing again as you can see for yourselves”.

Additionally, he informed that a new water supply pipe line will be laid from the Aberdeen Bridge to solve the situation at Crab Town and that Guma will have to acquire a piece of land at Susu village for the construction of a Service Tank and Booster Pumping station to effectively end the water challenge in the community.

Speaking, Hon. Mohamed Rahman Sheriff Coker said some of his constituents have been crying a lot over the issue of poor water supply to sections of the Aberdeen community. He added that the issue of valve tampering by locals have become persistent thereby causing many residents to suffer unnecessarily. “Action will be taken to inform residents to protect the valves and ensure that only authorized persons from Guma can access them”, he asserted.

The Acting Managing Director, Guma Valley Water Company, Ing. Francis Lahai said “what we have come to realize at Aberdeen today is that people are not getting water supply as they are supposed to because some mischievous people are shutting down the valves and sending the water to some other part of the community. We need to do more patrols and monitoring to ensure people get their fair share of water supply during the valve regulation times”.

Ing. Lahai furthered that the water supply is available but people are just manipulating with the valves to put Guma Valley in a bad light. He concluded by saying that Guma will put in place further measures to secure the valves and continue with the mains extension activities it started last year to improve on the water supply access in the community.

During the tour of the Aberdeen community, the Minister visited Susu Village, Aberdeen Community Primary School, Crab Town, Cape Road, Nylander, Kincardine, and Ibo Streets.