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Testimony

Interview with Alexis : engineer for resource and water management in Adé

Alexis has been a member of the SOLIDARITÉS team in Adé since April 2008. He describes his role at the heart of the team and his commitment to his fellow citizens.

How long have you been working for SOLIDARITÉS and what motivated you to work for them ?

I have been working for SOLIDARITÉS since April 17th 2008. SOLIDARITÉS’ projects in Chad have given me the opportunity to put my skills to good use and be of service to the most needy of my fellow citizens. Our work has gathered together expats, as well as locals and Chadians from other regions. Our projects transcend ethnic, religious, and cultural backgrounds. Our goal is to provide everyone with drinking water. In addition to this, working for SOLIDARITÉS allows me to provide for my family’s needs.

What did you do before joining SOLIDARITÉS ?

I am an engineer in resource and water management. My training is mainly technical and I have my engineering diploma. Before SOLIDARITÉS I was very active within sports and educational organizations, working mostly with young people. After that I worked on hydraulic drilling for a company called STH. After my internship I worked on the development of irrigation networks and water towers.

What do you like about your work ?

I appreciate SOLIDARITÉS' methodical approach and the open collaboration between supervisors and employees. The best example of this is my former watsan supervisor, Julien Racray. He constantly promoted dialogue and autonomy within the teams in order to get the best out of everyone. His management style was aimed at getting the recipient populations to participate in their own development, so they do not burden the community initiative with debt and force it to rely on hand-outs.

Can you describe a typical day's work for us, as well as your role within the team ?

Each day of work in Adé brings its own events. Everything starts by defining team agendas and then getting out stock materials before the teams leave for the intervention sites. Along with the program supervisor, I coordinate the well technicians, the hygiene awareness promoters, and maintenance on the network. I search for potential water sites in rural areas with an auger to detect the presence of water. This detection is the prerequisite for starting work on a site. With daily supervision I follow-up the activities and the quality of the work carried out; we have to prioritize based on the urgency of the situation. In a way, I am a facilitator for the teams and an intermediary between the teams and my immediate supervisor.
Water analysis is a long process; whether it is microbiological or physicochemical, the aim is to determine the quality for consumption or any other domestic use (cooking, personal hygiene, cleaning…). In this way; we are able to produce monthly readings. On site, we are interested in microbiology, or thermo-tolerant coliform bacteria, which are generally pathogenic microorganisms. The membrane filtration technique (Wagtech kit) determines if a sample of water (taken from a specific site and incubated for 24 hours at 44°C/111°F) is drinkable or whether it will have to be treated. For the physicochemical aspect, we use a colorimetric comparison method. This determines the index or presence of specific chemical elements potentially dangerous to health (fluorides, nitrates, arsenic). Some elements, such as iron or manganese, are not harmful but can change the color of the water. Our analysis allows us to reassure people about the use of this water.

Can you tell us about your daily working conditions? Do you encounter any difficulties ?

In terms of security, the situation in Adé is particularly volatile and unstable. There are widespread rumors of rebel infiltration since the attack in February 2008. The heavy military presence doesn’t help our teams, especially regarding the management of water points. Sharing with civilian populations is not always compulsory, and military activity can cause a great deal of damage. Women and children, who usually collect the water, pay the price for these setbacks by waiting for several hours before they can fill their jars.
However, we continue building wells, distributing filters and promoting hygiene in rural areas. Residents in these areas face acts of looting, theft of livestock and attacks near the wadis. The nomads are the principal scapegoats, but there are others, such as road bandits who disturb the peace of these villages. They extort money from people returning from the nearby markets. The border nearby is porous and makes it easy for them to get away.

Do you have anecdotes or special stories that you would like to share with us ?

In 1979 I was just a child when my family left Chad because of the political and social unrest affecting the country at that time. There was one year of this, and during the attacks in February I had to live this experience again when I fled to neighboring Cameroon (Kousseri, Maltam) with my family.

Another anecdote comes to me at present about Issakh Hamid; one of our well workers. While on a site survey south of Adé, where the SOLIDARITÉS wells are now, he told us about the events which caused him to leave his home village of Koloy in 2006. The janjaweeds assaulted his village, they set fire to the huts in order to force the people to leave. Then they fired at the ones who remained; with the thick smoke, they were at the mercy of the bullets flying around. Some fled to Adé, and were forced to leave everything behind, (bags of harvest, fruit trees, livestock). The memories remain with Issakh; two years after the incident, he is still overcome by strong emotion whenever he thinks of these events that changed the course of his existence and that of his family forever.

Update : june 2009