Mombasa residents to quench their thirst with more water

Once every week, Tamary Saru, a resident of Maweni in Nyali subcounty in Mombasa county, wakes up at 3am to book a spot in the queue for fresh water from the tap.

Most of the time, water comes out between 4am and 5am for an hour or two. This happens once a week or in some cases once every fortnight.

“If you wake up late, you will find the queue is already long, reducing the chances of you getting the water. People come with as many as 20 jerrycans,” Saru tells the Star.

At home, they have 25 jerrycans which they fill whenever they get the opportunity.

This lasts them about a month which goes a long way in helping them cop with the water scarcity in Mombasa.

“We use the fresh tap water for drinking and cooking,” she says.

Her family is somewhat stable and have sunk a borehole for themselves. They use the borehole water for all other chores.

Priscilah Chorongo, also a Maweni resident, is not so lucky.

She has no means to sink a borehole and depends on the tap water provided by the Mombasa Water and Sanitation Company.

She lives in a rented double-room house.

“I have only 10 jerrycans. I cannot fill all of them because neighbours usually complain that they are too many and I have to give them opportunities to fetch water too,” Chirongo said.

Worse still, she has a one-year-old son, meaning she has to use a lot of water.

However, the single mother has to suffer to get the precious but scarce commodity.

“Whenever the situation gets extreme, which is more often nowadays, I have to buy water from vendors. During those times, they sell 20 litres at the range of between Sh70 and Sh100,” the vegetable vendor says.

According to the Coast Water Works Development Agency chair Omar Boga, Mombasa county’s water demand is 150,000 cubic meters per day but the county can only supply 40,000 cubic metres a day.

This could however change soon after the national government launched two projects worth Sh1.3 billion in Kisauni and Nyali subcounties last Wednesday.

The two projects, dubbed ‘Improvement of Water Services in Mainland North’, will involve laying of 65km of water pipelines in Nyali, and more than 70km of pipelines in Kisauni, said Water Cabinet Secretary Sicily Kariuki during the launch.

These will ensure over 9,000 new water connections in the two subcounties, and increase water coverage in the county from 30 per cent to about 45 per cent.

Saru, Chorongo and some 216,577 other people in Nyali subcounty are expected to benefit from the project.

The Nyali project, which will cost Sh516 million, will connect 4,000 new people to metered water, while the Kisauni project will cost around Sh800 million and will see 5,000 new connections to piped water.

The projects, which are expected to be completed by June 2022, are funded by the government and the World Bank.

Apart from Maweni, other areas where water problems are persistent include Kongowea, Nyali, VoK, Bombolulu and Kisumu Ndogo.

CS Kariuki said the projects are also expected to reduce water loss (non-revenue water) through leaks, and increase customer base leading to increased revenue for Mombasa Water and Sanitation Company (Mowasco).

Kariuki said the Nyali project will see 107,080 cubic metres of water supplied to Nyali subcounty by 2035.

Mowasco chair Omae Nyarandi said the water problem in the county has increased in the past few years because no water projects have been undertaken in the county.

However, he expressed confidence the water problems will end in the next two years.

“I am sure in the next two years we will all be comfortable. We will be looking to have more water either from Baricho and other sources,” Nyarandi said.

Water Principal Secretary Samwel Alima said he will be tracking the projects every Wednesday evening when he will be meeting with the contractor to ensure progress is made.

Kariuki said the Nyali and Kisauni projects are two of 687 major water projects across the country that the ministry is doing.

The long-term solution for the water crisis in Mombasa and the Coast region will be the construction of the Sh20 billion Mwache dam, which is expected to start in November.

The CS said the Mwache dam will provide 45 per cent more water to Mombasa pushing the coverage for the county to about 85 per cent.

Kariuki said only 20 families are yet to be compensated for their land in priority area one in Kinango to allow for the construction of the Mwache dam.

“We are in talks with them. They want an alternative area where they can farm,” Kariuki said.   

The Mwache dam is expected to be completed in 2025 and is expected to put 2,600 hectares of land under irrigation in Kwale county.

The construction of the Mwache dam project is meant to harness the flood flows from Mwache River basin in Kinango subcounty and help tackle persistent water shortages in the coastal region.

The dam is an 87.5 meter-tall concrete gravity dyke, impounding 118 million cubic meters for water supply and irrigation, and is expected to boost the water supply for Kwale and Mombasa counties.

The government, through the Treasury, is also currently examining a proposal by the Mombasa county government to initiate a water desalination plant.

The plant, once approved and done, will desalinate about a million cubic metres of sea water daily.

“The National Treasury is accessing the salinisation proposal and determining its feasibility and sustainability. Once the Treasury has done its assessment from engineering, technical and economic impact, it will release the funds,” Kariuki said.