Fighting the ‘Water Mafia’ with Pipes in the Sky
A project in a Kenyan slum is confounding the powerful water cartels by pumping clean water through pipes suspended in the air
In Kibera, the largest slum in Kenya’s capital Nairobi, access to water is a minefield. The marketplace is dominated by water cartels, or mafias - water is often syphoned off from the mains supply and pumped in through dirty hosepipes.
But Kennedy Odede is trying to change that. Dubbed the ‘president of the poor’, he set up a scheme to pump water up from a borehole deep underground, and deliver it through a new network of pipes with a difference. To avoid contamination, and keep them safe from the cartels, Kennedy’s pipes are suspended 15m in the air on a series of poles that carry them around the slum.
In this episode of World Hacks we travel to Kibera to meet Kennedy, see the aerial waterways in action, and ask if his scheme can expand to help people living in slums across the globe.
Presenter: Dougal Shaw
Producer: Sam Judah
(Photo: Kennedy Odede. Credit: BBC)
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