Residents of Pupuni-Tortibo cry over lack of potable water

Correspondence from the Eastern region

Residents of Pupuni, Tortibo, Kokono and Odorkorm in the Asuogyaman District of the Eastern Region, are battling perennial difficulties with accessing water.

Though some NGOs put up some boreholes to assuage the situation, majority of them have broken down, compelling residents to walk long distances to access the commodity from the few remaining water sources.

Trekking to and fro with buckets and pans in hand in search of water have become a daily routine for the residents, particularly women and children.

The situation, they say, is affecting their socio-economic activities.

A recent visit to the community by GhanaWeb showed that though there were some seven boreholes in the communities, only two were functional.

Some women seen walking a long distance to collect water lamented over the scarcity of the commodity in their communities.

Esther Tamatey has lived in the community for the past thirty years.

“We don’t have water here, we suffer a lot. We have to go to last stop before we get water,” said the worried woman.

Standing by one of the broken-down boreholes, she said it had been broken for the past year but was yet to be fixed.

She appealed to the authorities to ensure that the situation was remedied to solve the challenges confronting the people.

Another member of the community who has lived there for the past ten years, Terkpertey Comfort, described the water from the standing boreholes as unhealthy for human consumption.

“We need water. Our source of water is far. The water we get is coloured, has bad taste and very salty so we need assistance.” She said.

When asked what the response of authorities had been to their plight, she said, “whenever we complain, they promise to come today, tomorrow but nothing is done so we’re pleading with them to come assist us with accessible water.”

Emmanuel Kpobi has also lived all his life in Tortibo. He wondered why their plight had not been addressed despite persistent pleas.

“In this community, we don’t have potable water. The water we have contains salt,” he said.

Just like the others, he expressed disappointment in the failure of the local Assembly to solve the challenge despite several assurances, though he remained hopeful that it would be attended to soon.

Tamatey Theresa also said, “we lack water here. For the past twenty years, we haven’t had a reliable source of water and we suffer before accessing it so we beg the government to fix our water problem for us.

The Assemblymember for Pupuni Electoral Area, Jonathan Ayamdor, in an interview with GhanaWeb, indicated that efforts to get the problem solved had not been successful.

He named affected communities as Kokono, Tortibo, Pupuni and Odorkom and said though he had severally raised the issue on the floor of the Assembly, not much had been done to address the issue.

“The whole electoral area, there is a big problem concerning water. We are in Akosombo and there is no pipe-borne water in this community,” said Mr. Ayamdor.

According to him, though he facilitated the construction of seven boreholes in the area to solve the problem, only two were currently working.

“When I came as Assemblyman, I managed to construct seven boreholes but at the moment as I’m talking to you, it is only two that are working, the rest are broken down.”

The situation, he added, forces school children to wake up at dawn to walk long distances in search of water before preparing for school and called for swift intervention to solve the problem.