Water Shortage Big Challenge In Nimule, South Sudan

By Lioto Samuel

Many residents especially the women are forced to wake up at 3:00 am, to go and fetch water from the hand pump boreholes drilled in each Boma.

Many of the women have complained of being attacked by gang groups as they make their way to fetch water.

“I was almost raped by a man yesterday when I was coming from the borehole. The unidentified man told me to stop under the mango trees near my home, and immediately threw down the jerry can from my head and started to strip me. But I over-powered him and took off while screaming. When he saw people running from their homes to my rescue, he jumped in to the bush and ran away,” said Mary Mitiribwe, a resident of Lopa Boma.

In the list of the over 15 boreholes drilled and spread unevenly in each Boma in Nimule about 8 of these boreholes have broken down, thus worsening the problem of water shortage in the region.

“Even for the functional boreholes, you will pump and pump for over 10 minutes before seeing a drop of water, and to fill a 20 liter jerry can, you need over half an hour, amidst the over 300 jerry cans on the queue,” said Mrs. Jackeline Pareo, a wife to one of the Boma sultans in the area.

However, the residents of Nimule are requesting the town water and sanitation department to get partners and friends who will help in the repair of the already broken down boreholes.

“One of the problems is that the drilling engineers did not do a correct assessment of where a borehole could have been drilled, and thus some of these boreholes don’t reach the water table deep down, a reason for their breakdown,” said Mr. Nyamara Churika, one of the Boma development committee member.

The community leaders in each Boma have however come up with a plan of collecting at least 20 South Sudanese Pounds per household per Boma which will help in the repair, maintenance and buying of spare parts for these worn out boreholes.