Thousands hit by water shortage

Thousands of families in Somalia's Middle Juba region need urgent help after being hit by a severe water shortage caused by catchment areas drying up and boreholes malfunctioning, local officials said.

"The situation in some villages is very bad and we need to truck water to them," Abas Haji Abdullahi, the district commissioner, told IRIN on 18 February.

Up to 4,000 families in 33 villages, between 50km and 80km east and west of Sako, the main town in the area, are affected. The villages of Labo Yaaq, Borow Qarare, Moga Adad, Gomir, Asharow Yaal and Bagdey are among the worst hit.

Abdullahi appealed to aid agencies to help in trucking water to the affected populations, saying Sako district could not cope with the problem alone.

"We need the support of agencies to intervene before the situation deteriorates even further," he said.

An aid worker, who requested anonymity, said most of these villages depended on catchments and boreholes for their water. However, poor rains in 2007 meant most catchment areas had dried up.

"The catchments have dried up and many of the boreholes are not working, due to lack of maintenance and repair," the worker said. There were enough boreholes to cover the population "but they have fallen into disrepair".

He said the first priority would be to deliver water to affected people "but repairing and maintaining the existing boreholes must be a close second or we will have this problem over and over again."

If we don’t find a quick way to help these people, I am worried they may all move to town and overwhelm us

Some of those affected have started moving to Juba River and Sako town, Abdullahi said, adding that at least 600 families had moved to Sako in the past two weeks.

He said most were staying with relatives, while others had set up temporary shelters.

"If we don’t find a quick way to help these people, I am worried they may all move to town and overwhelm us," the DC said.

He complained about the dearth of agencies operating in the district.

An NGO source, who did not want to be named, told IRIN the reason there were no aid agencies operating in the Sako area was because of security concerns. "There was a security incident last week involving NGO staff," he said.

ah/mw