AddThis SmartLayers

African village gets fresh water on tap thanks to weekly’s appeal

A remote village in West Africa has fresh water on tap for the first time ever thanks to a weekly newspaper’s campaign.

The Stourbridge News’ Well Of Life Appeal, launched just a year ago, raised £12,350 to fund a solar-powered water pump and farmland irrigation system for the drought-stricken village of Sintet, in The Gambia.

The campaign was run hand-in-hand with local school Ridgewood High, which sends a group of adults and students out to the country every year on an aid mission, delivering supplies and helping in schools.

The appeal was fuelled by the story of an eight-year-old boy, Mustapha Tamba, who plunged to his death while trying to draw water from one of the village’s crude, hand-drawn, near-empty wells last year.

The News splashed on the campaign's success in Thursday's edition

The News splashed on the campaign’s success in Thursday’s edition

The system has been named Mustapha’s Well Of Life in his honour, and a competition was run among primary schools by the News for pupils to design a plaque bearing his name, attracting around 300 entries.

News assistant editor Pete Wallace joined the Ridgewood’s Project Gambia group last week, and ran a daily blog focussing on the group’s work there.

The plaque was presented to Mustapha’s mother last Friday.

Said Pete: “The presentation and opening ceremony was incredibly emotional – the villagers mobbed us as we arrived, singing and dancing non-stop for more than two hours, before preparing a traditional Gambian welcome meal of chicken and rice.

“Seeing Mustapha’s mother with tears in her eyes as she read aloud the epitaph ‘Mustapha’s Well of Life – Never Forgotten’ on the plaque was one of the most moving moments of my life.”