2017-10-25Staff Report 2 Obrein Simasiku Omainda The Omuthiya Town Council has begun pumping toxic water from five wells at Omainda village as the water was polluted with mosquito chemicals and unfit for human consumption. The CEO of Omuthiya, Samuel Mbango, said officials might have exceeded the required dosage to treat the water hence it became unfit due to a high chemical content that accumulated in the wells. “Officials are already at the site and are pumping out the water so that it can be reusable again. We treat water sources within town just before the breeding season of mosquitoes in order to avoid an outbreak. We have been doing this for the past four years after the deadly mosquito outbreak at the time which left some animals dead and people getting malaria,” explained Mbango. He assured that the water situation would be normalised. Over the past few weeks people were left without water as they depended on the wells as their only source of water, including for their animals. That situation forced them to take their animals for about three kilometres to the nearest dam, while the community relied on a few individuals connected to the water pipeline. However the situation worsened when some individuals ceased to assist the community with water, complaining that their water bills were skyrocketing. The wells were treated last month on September 22. “My water bill is just going up, and I have not received a single cent from the community. The situation cannot go on like this. It is terrible and I will not continue assisting them anymore, otherwise I will not manage to settle my bill,” said Esther Ndeutepo who has a tap at her homestead. New Era at the site last week was welcomed by a heavy stench, while the water is visibly whitish in colour. The community argued at the time that the treatment was done without their knowledge and they only realized it later, as their animals started to refuse to drink the water. “We did not know about this whole issue of putting chemicals in the wells – why didn’t they consult us whether we wanted it or not? Even though we understand it was for a good cause, our voice matters in this regard. Now they have put us in this predicament,” lamented one of the affected villagers Gabriel Nambuli while opening one of the wells. Nambuli said that they had approached the town council and a certain official said it was the town council that indeed placed the chemicals in the wells for the purpose of killing mosquitoes. 2017-10-25Staff Report 2
