Residents of Tana Delta subsounty in Tana River county have made a passionate appeal to the national government to construct a bridge a cross a section of River Tana to enable them to access their remote villages.
They said during floods accessing their villages is a major challenge due to high waters, hippos and crocodiles which is a risk to their lives.
Normally they use canoes when it's flooding time but when the waters are low, they just walk across the channel that leads to the river.
Apart from the bridge they also want the Kenya Wildlife Service to contain rogue elephants that are destroying their crops.
They said the roads were also in pathetic condition making it hard for them to transport the harvests from their farms to the main towns of Minjila or Garsen.
Tana River Woman Representative Amina Dika said the area that has more 15 villages produces the best watermelons, tomatoes and maize, among other crops, but had challenges in accessibility.
“When you reach the river, vehicles cannot cross so residents have to use canoe but some are forced to walk on foot across the river because there is only one canoe,” she said.
Dika said most farmers she talked to complained of poor road networks and called on the authorities to construct a bridge to enable the farmers to transport their goods to Malindi and Garsen town.
She said the road should also be graded to ease access, adding that on the other side that links the Delta to Kipini, two boats can be allocated to the area to ease the movements of people and goods.
“I am happy to hear that I am the first leader to visit this village but I know my colleagues will also come and we shall see how we shall help each other but as the office of the Woman rep I said farming will be given priority,” she said.
Already the woman rep during her visit to Shantama village gave out 15 water pumps and pipes to farmers with each machine having a 100-metre-long pipe.
On the issue of elephants terrorising residents, she said she would hold talks with the KWS to ensure they resolve the problem and enable people to live freely.
Bocha Dido, a resident of Kipao Village, said the roads were in a bad state and they deliberately led the woman rep to pass that route so as to see what the community was going through.
He said they normally have challenges transporting food from the farms to the market due to the bad roads.
“Even the boda boda operators who help can only manage one trip only due to the nature of the roads,” he said.
He said whenever there is an accident like recently when one person drowned it was difficult to rescue and normally lives are lost.
Dido said there are crocodiles and hippos and require a rescue boat in case of emergency.
In Kipao Mwanajamba and Shakaburo, he said crops were all destroyed in the farms by elephants and no compensation from KWS.
He said whenever residents kill wildlife, the KWs respond immediately because they have their informer but if crops are destroyed, they do not respond at all.
Mohamed Dello, a resident of Shantama, emphasised on the need for human wildlife conflicts to be addressed as women are really suffering whenever they go to search for water.
He also asked the government to grade the road and construct a bridge so as to ease access to the movement of goods and people.
Otieno Ngalla, a resident of Shantama, said whenever it floods very few people remain there because of fear to be swept away by the waters.