In the district of Bombali, one village has a brand new toilet. In Kamayintin, Kadiatou Samura has successfully built her family’s first latrine. With the help of her fellow villagers, Samura has drastically reduced the number of illnesses the children of her village are contracting.


The overall goal of the latrine project is to declare villages across Sierra Leone as “open-defecation-free”. UNICEF aims to roll out the initiative through all 10 districts of the country by 2010, with help from ActionAid, Plan International, Oxfam, and GOAL. Just one-third of rural Sierra Leoneans have access to clean water and sanitation, according to UNICEF’s Victor Kinyanjui. Sierra Leone’s population in rural villages typically rely on the nearby rivers and open spaces for urination and defecation. These rivers are also the source of cooking and bathing water, and often, “open defecation” means that children are relieving themselves directly in front of the hut where they live, near kitchens. The normal roadblock in the process of creating more latrines is usually the money and coordination required for outside organizations and the government to build the latrines in villages.


The new model allows for the villagers to find local materials, labor, and money to build the latrines themselves. Outside officials, such as sanitation experts, only supply the research and knowledge needed for the villagers to learn what type of toilet would suit both the village budget and topography of the land. Kadiatou Samura’s toilet, with an earthen floor, local wood walls, and straw roof, was essentially free to create. According to UNICEF’s Victor Kinyanjui, a standard modern toilet would cost approximately $100 (the equivalent of one third an average Sierra Leonean’s annual salary).


Bombali district women’s leader, Kadiatou Kamu, insists that the women of the village must be vigilant about the maintenance of the toilets. “Before our children were defecating near our kitchens – it got on our food. We women have been careless, but we do the work. When Papa is around he can shout why is this place filthy? But he will not clean up the kaka from his child,” she said. While there have been some concerns about the new toilets from District councilor Eric Ceesa, who finds the toilets to be poorly ventilated, inconveniently located, and an attraction for snakes, UNICEF’s Victor Kinyanjui believes that once the villagers become aware of the rapidity with which the latrines can be built within the villages’ means, the toilets will be built throughout the country. The lack of affordability for subsidized toilets dramatically slows down the process of creating greater accessibility to clean water, as Sierra Leone works to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.




Source, IRIN