A project to decongest Freetown appears to have died in the waters since it was announced by Freetown City Council last year (FCC).
Under the decongestion project, 5,000 houses were to be constructed so that slum dwellers would be relocated to safe places.
The initiation of the project has direct linkage to natural disasters which befall slum dwellers every year.
In the last two years, 2018 and 2019, flooding in slum communities have wreaked the greatest havoc, an issue that has become a hot topic.
Last year’s flooding disasters in slum communities was the worst as many lives were lost and several people displaced.
Local and international non-governmental organisations as well as government agencies had cause to stretch their human and material resources to ease the suffering of the victims.
The announcement of the relocation project last year made slum dwellers ecstatic dreaming to live in decent housing condition. But, the dream is turning into a nightmare as the project is failing to materialise.
Most of the slum communities especially Kroo Bay, Susan’s Bay, Mabela and Moa Wharf have been over-crowded and calls for relocation remain high. The calls have been prompted owing to the appalling conditions slum dwellers face in their various communities.
A study conducted in 2015 in Susan’s Bay community indicated that 15,000 slum dwellers share only two toilets.
The Section Chief of Susan’s Bay Community, Pa Alimamy said the situation was not good for them, and the help of NGO’s was urgently needed to ease their plight.
Since only two toilets service Susan’s Bay community, talk of improved sanitary condition is meaningless.
Dustbins where pigs and flies help themselves with human waste and rot are close to dwelling houses. Residents have no option of where to go and they therefore have to put up with the eyesore.
It is a normal sight to see adult male and female to defecate along seashores in day light adding to a deteriorating sanitary condition.
Those men and women who cannot venture along the shore to ease themselves become prisoners of daylight.
The slum community, Susan Bay is represented by a councillor and a member of parliament but their suffering still worsens.
An official of a local NGO, Augustine Fornah told this medium that few years back, some slum dwellers were relocated to 6-Mile in the Western Area Rural District, few Kilometres out of Freetown.
Money and other non-food items were provided for them just to get them off the slums.
“Few have gone while the majority still remains in the slum communities waiting for disasters,” he said.
Fornah tells this medium that the solution to the decongestion of Freetown is not a one-day one.
Freetown, he says, has been neglected for years especially in respect of the amount of people that should stay in a city once inhabited by 7,000 residents.
Fornah blames it on over-centralisation of essential services in the city at the detriment of provincial communities which, he said, had led to such a menace.
For now, he goes on, soft measures cannot solve the problem as youths have developed an unwavered interest to stay in the city come what may.
“Although electricity, colleges and universities, mobile and internet facilities have been brought to communities in the provinces, Freetown is still congested,” he said.
On the other side of the argument, Mohamed Sesay a retired principal of one of the schools in Freetown said Freetown became congested as a result of the civil war that lasted for ten years.
The country’s only city, Sesay says, used to have a lesser population, but the war swells it.
“Most upcountry residents who escaped to Freetown during the war did not go back after it ended. They decide to stay in Freetown and engage on petty trading,” Sesay said.
No effort, at that time, was made by government, he continued, to ensure that the upcountry residents return to their communities where they would have been gainfully employed in agriculture and other economic activities.
“Today, the city is overpopulated. The failings of yesterday are hunting us today,” he said.
Mr Sesay suggested no soft measure to end the problem of congestion in Freetown, but tough and radical measures.
Shutting down of slums and other hilltop communities are some of the measures suggested by Sesay to prevent population explosion in Freetown.
“The shutting down of the communities comes with a cost which government should be ready to shoulder,” he suggested.
Sesay said it would not be easy for government to decongest Freetown, but the bull had to be taken by the horns to do justice to the country.
The congestion of Freetown, no doubt, breeds viruses and diseases of various kinds. It poses a constant threat to the health and socio-economic well-being of a great many people.
The evidence of Freetown being tagged as a breeding place for viruses and diseases of various kinds showcased in two consecutive viral attacks.
When Ebola struck Sierra Leone in May 2014, Freetown was declared an epicentre within months. Currently, as the country wrestles with Corona Virus Disease, Covid-19 for short, Freetown again has been declared as an epicentre within a month meaning the virus is spreading fast in the city than in any other community.
It goes without saying that there is a close nexus between epicentre status of Freetown during viral outbreaks and congestion.
The most popular argument goes: It would always be a herculean task for governments to combat viral strikes as long as Freetown remains overpopulated.
The congestion in slum and hilltop communities has a spill-over effect to major streets in the central business district of the municipality where traders have colonised major streets.
Public opinion has it that unregulated housing structure in slum and hilltop communities led to overcrowding in principal streets in the city.
In an interview with FCC Public Relations Office, it came out clear that FCC does not have the mandate to issue building permits.
“FCC is not responsible for the allocation of land to people to build houses,” a FCC official said.
Ministry of Lands, Housing and Country Planning is a government institution charged with the responsibility of regulating building projects undertaken by either a private entity or government body.
An official at the Surveys and Lands Department said all slum communities have been banned.
“Moa Wharf, Susan’s Bay, Kroo Bay, Mabela, Big Wharf, Old Wharf, Shell Pipeline and other communities have been declared inhabitable. This means, nobody should stay there,” he said.
Although aforementioned communities have been banned, slum dwellers continue to stay there with hope of government assistance. Government officials however legitimise habitation of slums by slum dwellers as they mount campaigns in such communities during the polls for votes.
Congestion of Freetown is a never-ending social problem as long as slums and hilltop communities continue to flourish.