By Alfred Koroma
When water entered her bedroom in September, Rugiatu Yillah said she felt like the world was coming to an end.
Later realizing their rice farms had also drowned, she felt even worse.
This was the first time Yillah and other residents of Tombo Wallah, a community along the Little Scarcies River had experienced flooding that led to the loss of several farms and houses.
“We survived the flooding, but I’m afraid of what might happen next with our farms and properties destroyed,” she said.
As they grapple with the shock of their loss, Tombo Wallah residents who spoke to Concord Times point to the prolonged rainfall as the cause of the disaster, wondering when the rain would stop.
This year’s continuous rain appeared to have triggered a stagnant increase in the volume of water in the Little Scarcies River, surging into rice farms nearby. Most of the farms along the river, where harvesting was due to begin late November, drowned.
According to Alimamy Aboke Kamara, Councilor Ward 204 of Mambolo Chiefdom, many of the farmers lost farms where they had already planted 10 bushels of rice, some 15 and 20 bushels before the water took over in a disaster that brought down about 16 houses and affected over 70 homes in various communities across Tombo Wallah.
He said some of the farmers took loans to cultivate those farms – buy rice seeds, feed and pay those they hired for labor, with the hope of repaying the loans after harvest. “Water took over all those farms.”
“People depend on loans for everything we do here,” the Councilor said. “Many would have to run away from this community. Because if you can’t get a way to harvest rice and pay your loan, you end up running away.”
Wallah Res (rice)
‘Wallah Res,’ as it is known locally, is a popular domestic rice produced mainly by farmers in the Northern part of the country. It tastes similar to that of parboiled rice, less sticky and significant, especially for those seeking to avoid the regular white rice for medical reasons.
Tombo Wallah, and its surrounding communities affected by last month’s flooding, including Tombo Rolass, Tombo Banka, Tombo Mayeankain, Tombo Comdo and Tombo Makribo in Kambia are among the major cultivators of the rice.
“If you have heard about Wallah Rice before, Tombo Wallah is the breadbasket of that rice,” says Abdul Rahim Bangura, a resident and former Councilor of the community who also lost his farm.
“Absolutely, there is nothing left in the farms. Except we have to find another solution. It would be a very serious problem for our people,” he added.
“I think it’s the too much rain”
Most of the affected persons who spoke to Concord Times emphasised such a disaster had never happened before in Tombo Wallah.
“Since I was born here in 1974 and grew up here, this is the first time water has entered my house,” Alpha M Sesay, a resident of the community, told Concord Times.
Adekalie Nambay Bangura, a farmer whose farm completely drowned, similarly repeated that since he was born, this was the first time the community has experienced flooding that destroys farms and the township, suggesting they were not expecting the disaster.
“I think it’s the too much rain,” he said.
Sierra Leone often experiences heavy torrential rain between the months of July, August and September each year.
For this year, it is still seriously raining even in the month of October.
In an assessment report published in September 2024, the National Disaster Management Agency (NDMA) says a total of 7,324 hectares of farmland have been inundated and 167 buildings have collapsed this year as a result of heavy rainfall.
But the assessment, which was done in collaboration with the Sierra Leone Meteorological Agency indicates that the destruction was mainly caused by ‘heavy transboundary precipitation’ from neighboring Guinea.
The report says Sierra Leone ‘did not experience rain capable of causing such significant flooding and destruction, justifying an earlier forecast made in May by the Meteorological Agency that the country was going to experience low amounts of rainfall below the normal or average levels experienced over the past years.
Because many of the farmers affected along the Little Scarcies River believe the country’s rainfall caused their disaster, Concord Times contacted the Agency to comment on its forecast, but it declined.
Human activities
In addition to farming, fishing and sand mining is also common along the river in Tombo Wallah.
Years of cutting trees and sand mining along the river may have played a role in the cause of the unprecedented disaster, says Mohamed S Bangura, Chairman of Tombo Wallah Tatareneh Association (TOWTA), a community based association that mobilized food and cash worth thirty thousand Leones (Le30, 000) in September to support those affected by the flooding.
Bangura said there were many mangrove trees along the river side that were preventing wind and water from entering the town, but they are no longer there.
“Two things may have caused this: sand mining and the cutting of trees along the riverside. There are places where there used to be plenty of trees, but if you go there, it is now an empty and open land,” he said “So because of this, water now has more space to enter.”
“People have to accept expert advice that, when you cut a stick, you plant a stick. When you cut one, plant two, he added. “That helps.”
Rice is a major food in Sierra Leone. The country consumes one of the highest amounts of rice per capita in the sub-Saharan African region, spending an average of over $100 million per year on rice imports, says a paper published by the World Bank in 2020.
Despite the high reliance on imported rice, local farmers like those in Tombo Wallah and elsewhere in the country depend on the rice from their farms as their primary source of income and food.
More than 90% of those farmers sell a portion of their rice harvest to generate income, despite the fact that they are operating at a subsistence level, according to 2015 Comprehensive Food Security and Vulnerability Analysis.
For the Wallah Rice farmers, they sell the rice they produce locally and export to Guinea.
That means, the drowning of rice farms in Tombo Wallah and its surrounding communities, coupled with the homes destroyed is likely to have a more devastating consequence.
At the time they spoke to Concord Times in late September, some of the farmers were still hopeful, it would stop raining at the end of the month, and the river which had drowned their farms could drain away, allowing for a possible replanting.
But that has not been the case.Those farmlands remain unusable, full with water, leaving Yillah and farmers along the river worried about their future.
“We are now thinking about the coming year.” “How are we going to live our lives?” Adekalie asked, lamenting, “I feel there will be suffering.”
