With the help of former national basketball player, James Bangura, British philanthropist-Sam Walker aka Chameleon on Saturday March 30 2024 inaugurated clean drinking water supply systems to households of over 10,000 people in the Kolleh Town Community.
Kolleh Town happens to be one of the most deplorable communities within the Freetown Municipality, The greatest of majority of the population is how to access safe drinking water which is leading to water-borne diseases such as diarrhea, one of the main causes of death for children under five years.s
To get safe drinking water is a daily challenge for the youths and the age able people. Sometimes after finding a reliable and safe water source made the school going children to become tried to study at night. Beside the above the parents are always afraid not to let their girl child used the opportunity to get pregnant while in school. This is the challenge Sam Walker a British philanthropist through the help of James Bangura has embarked on to assist the people of Kolleh Town Community.
According to Mohamed James Bangura, he met his friend Walker in England in 2017 when he was there to play basketball so he decided to bring him to Sierra Leone. “I told him that there are so many deplorable communities who are desperately in need of help. In 2018, he was at the Kroo Bay Community where he donated a whole container of items and he also assisted other communities by providing clean water for them,” he said.
He furthered stated that this time around upon their visit to the Kolleh Town Community, the community people request to assist them with clean drinking water. He went on that they decided to provide them with clean drinking water. We made all the necessary arrangements with Guma Valley Water Company and they are here today doing the work so that these people will have access to clean drinking water,” Bangura stated.
Speaking to the media, Sam Walker aka Chameleon said his mission is literally to assist these people because the situation these people are faced with is very challenging, underscoring he got a clear vision of assisting the people in the slums in his mind four or five years ever since he came to Sierra Leone in 2018.
Walker went on that his vision is to assist the slums areas within Freetown in a way that no other foreign person has done before. My mission is to assist the people in the slums and to save life. When I see the amount of poverty in Africa and there are organizations out there raising millions of pounds and failing to assist the people so I want to make sure that I assist these people and do what these organization are failing to do. I want to make sure we assist these slums with better sanitation and provide them with clean water,” Walker affirmed.
He thanked the Government for allowing him to do such project which will see about 10, 000 people have access to pure clean water. “I would like to thank the government of President Bio for giving me the opportunity to do this project in this community. I want to also give credit to the first Lady for assisting the young ladies, especially in the ‘Hands of Girls’ project which is recognized world-wide and those survivors of rape.
In his part, the Community Disaster Management Committee (CDMC) National Chairperson, Daniel Bob James, who is residing in Kolleh Town community confirmed that he is the coordinator of all WASH related issues in all other communities so it’s an opportunity or God’s sent, when Walker came to their intervention because water is a very challenging issue to the community. Bob James went on that during the dry season they experiencing water problems and during the rainy season they experiencing water contamination because of flooding and the rest of it. We’ve been working with other NGOs who have been helping us as well, but when he came to us; we explained our major challenges which are really affecting the community which have about 10, 000 people said The CDMC’s National Chairperson maintained. “Other people has attempted to bring water all the way from the stadium, but they can’t afford to hit the target so with him coming in to do that for us, it’s like a God’s sent. We appreciate him and as the Disaster Management Committee team, we took the lead to make sure everything goes well. I will urge the people to use the facility very well and also make sure we sustain it. If someone comes to our aid and helps with such a facility we have to make sure we take great care of it,” James assured.
British philanthropist-Sam Walker aka Chameleon 
