[STATEMENT RELEASED 19 AUG 2017]

The ATO- ClimatEducate Project in Africa Team is saddened by the devastating mudslide that has claimed over 400 lives at Waterloo in the outskirts of Freetown, Sierra Leone. As active ATO-ClimatEducate Project volunteers, we send our condolences to the families of the victims as they prepare to pick up the pieces and carry on. We also call upon the international community to offer the much needed aid especially as the people of Waterloo and adjacent areas are exposed to the risk of malaria, cholera among other water-borne diseases.

While this is a natural disaster, it is a wakeup call, not only to Sierra Leone but also other countries that have allowed their people to dwell on potentially risky and protected areas to reconsider the safety of their countrymen.

​Climate change takes place over a long period and the impacts when the environment begins to fight back, as in the case of Sierra Leone’s Mount Sugar Loaf, are catastrophic. With extreme weather conditions being continually experienced in Africa, it is about time we took the threat seriously. If it is not heat waves, it is floods sweeping away crops and property and leaving the people in sorrow. To the people of Sierra Leone and Africa at large, let us take this as a tough lesson and stay out of harm’s way.


​Musa Muhammad Tanko, Regional Project Manager for Africa
Amara Sorie Tunkara, Project Advocacy Head for Sierra Leone
​Judith Nguta, Assistant Director for Information and Research
Sangih Mutua, Education & Curriculum Research Consultant
Hajara Grema Mallum, Project Advocacy Head for Nigeria
Randa Mustafa Ali Abdalrahman, Project Advocacy Head for Sudan
Massy Walas, Project Member
Swaray Abu-bakarr, Project Member
Andrew Prince Johnson, Project Member
Cliven Njekete, Project Member
Sussan Kwaghdoo, Project Member