Teshie and its environs are notoriously noted for its poverty in water supply.  

For decades, residents have struggled in vain to have reliable water flow through their pipes on daily basis.

 After many failed promises to provide reliable water to the residents in the vicinity, successive governments have only managed to draw a when-to expect-and-a- when- not-to-expect- water-timetable. Even that timetable is not reliable.

Residents  on many occasions sacrificed precious sleeping time to fetch water to fill their tanks on days and times their timetables read green but their taps went empty-red. In place of water, an inauspicious sound comes from the taps, a sound that would pass for a silent sigh from the buttocks of a doubled-barrelled woman. It sucks or maybe stinks.

But the residents have lived with this for years. At least they are assured of some portable water from their taps, once or twice in a week or in a month. And when it does come, they fill every gallon or even bottle available to last them another long period of drought.

The sorry story is even bleak for those residents living around the Mensah Sarbah catchment area of Teshie Tsuibleo in the Ledzorkuku constituency in Accra.

In Myjoyonline.com's Community report, residents there narrate how their barren taps reminds them of God's promise to cease raining manna from heaven.

One of the residents, Veronica Amarteifio told Myjoyonline.com for 12 years water has never passed through their taps.

She has lived within the community for over 35 years.

Within the vicinity is a multi-million giant water reservoir mounted to pump water to residents in the neighbourhood.  It was put up as a solution to the numbing water crisis in the neighbourhood. But even those living close to the reservoir who are now part of the 'timetable water beneficiaries' are complaining of erratic supply.

Two of such residents told Myjoyonline.com the reservoir had developed some mechanical fault and had not pumped water in the last three weeks.

For Veronica Amarteifio, popularly called Sister 'Nkoo' the giant reservoir has served no purpose to them. The water still does not flow through their taps.

So for the entire 12 years the Mensah Sarbah residents have had to depend on tankers to supply them with water. The few well to do ones have giant polytanks to store the water for domestic and commercial use. The many poor residents who could not afford polytanks settle on yellow gallons named after every sitting presidents in the country to buy water for their domestic use.

Some of the residents say because they cannot guarantee the purity of the water from these tankers, the only use to which they put this source of water is chiefly for bathing washing and sometimes cooking. They are forced to spend monies on sachet water for drinking.

Caught in this misery is the Assembly man for the area Mr Adjetey Adjei. He had stayed in the community for over 37 years and will be seeking another tenure in office in the coming local assembly elections.

While admitting he had not gotten water flowing through his tap for years, he blamed the situation on the increasing population in the neighbourhood and improper land demarcation.

"As population increases, the demand for water also increases," he noted, adding "we don't follow the demarcations of the area. We build on the shoulders of the road which makes it impossible to connect to the water line."

He said things are being done to change the situation.

He cited the water desalination project being undertaken by government in Nungua, a project he believed would ameliorate the water situation in the neighbourhood when completed.