Borehole spares Maa village 26km trek, snake hazard

The Esoit Sampu community in Kajiado county on Saturday heard horror stories about sharing water with snakes and hyenas.

The community lives at the foot of Esoit Samu Hills in the Mashuuru subcounty of the larger Kajiado county.

It has never had clean water since Independence.

However, those horrific tales are now history thanks to a well-wisher.

Speaking during the commissioning of the new borehole, Moses Sakat, a local elder, said the nearest water point involves walking 26 km to get salty water.

Sakat said on the hill nearby, there live hyenas, buffalos and snakes that had taken control of the only water pan built by the county government two years ago.

“When we have rainwater in the pan after the rains, men have to arm themselves to protect their wives and children when drawing the water,” Sakat said.

With the coming of a new borehole, Sakat said, the community will now access clean water without having to fight with wild animals for the scarce water in the pan.  

The community, with 500 households, has been sharing an open water pan with hyenas, baboons, snakes, wild dogs, hogs and buffalos from Esoit Sampu Hill, which stands tall in the village.

The village, too, has a school named after the local hill, Esoit Sampu Primary School. The teachers transferred to it went away because of hardships caused by the scarcity of water.

Headteacher Emily Yiare said parents of the children at the school used to fight with baboons and hyenas for water at the local water pan after the rains.

“When the water pan is dry, they used to wake up at 2 am to walk to the nearest water source, which is about 13km away, to get water for the school feeding programme,” she said.

Yiare, whose home is 30km from the school, said women risked their lives going to search for water 23km away from the village.

She said the teachers at the school could even miss eating meals because of water scarcity.

“This is the reason most of them left the school immediately. They are posted here. At some point, we had to deal with only three TSC teachers in the entire school,” the head teacher said.

Youth leader Benjamin Mishenua said he is 29 years old, and Saturday was the first time he saw clean water in the village.

“We are just grateful to God for He kept us out of the diseases associated with hyenas, such as rabies,” he said.

“Kajiado village used to share water from an open pan with wild animals.”

Jane Parsaoti, country director of the Victor Hamer Howard Hope Foundation, urged the community to use the water sparingly.

Whenever it rains, the community should use the water from the open pan to plant trees, she said.

Parsaoti dismissed claims that the county government of Kajiado contributed to the construction of the borehole.

“This is a project from our donors in America and Canada, and those claiming the county has a hand in this are mistaken,” she said.

“We do not want politics in our projects because our idea is to help our needy people based on what the community wants.”

The foundation's president Vic Hamer funded the construction of the borehole under the Give Me Water Lord-USA programme.

His foundation has sunk five boreholes in Kajiado and Nakuru counties and is also paying school fees for children from poor homes in several counties.

Hamer was accompanied by a couple, Crystal and Troy MacNaughton, whose late daughter, Shelby Brandon, was dedicated to the borehole.

The MacNaughtons and Hamer are also funding the construction of many churches in Kajiado and Makueni counties.