An acute water scarcity has hit Pishegu, a farming community in the Karaga district of Northern region putting residents’ lives and properties at risk.
Pishegu is one of the many communities in the region where the Water Company Limited is ineffective and residents have been living decades without clean water.
The community with a total population of 2500 locals are in routine competition with animals for water from a dried up dam which medics have declared unsafe for consumption.
The only reliable source of water aside two dysfunctional boreholes is the dam found few meters from the community constructed by the locals two decades ago.
Residents spend days and nights in search of water. Most children have also been forced to sometimes abandon classes and assist parents in the hectic search. Farmers are losing crops and their livestock to the situation, increasing the already hopeless crisis of malnutrition in the district.
The dam has been heavily contaminated with animal droppings, but locals are left with no option than to use for both domestic and commercial purposes.
Now, as rains failed, families have been forced to drink the infected water from the dirty dam.
Alhassan Yakubu, Assemblyman for the area told Kasapa News the effects of the scarcity were far reaching which can ultimately spark an outbreak of water borne disease.
He said getting clean water to drink is an everyday struggle which has become unbearable.
Mr. Yakubu revealed that young ladies do not want to take Pishegu men as couple due to the perennial problem.
“In rural setting, normally communities do know each other very well; so people are aware that we have a perennial water crisis so women from nearby communities would not like to marry our community men because they know when they come there, every year they have a cycle of water crisis”, the assembly member said adding that “if there is no intervention it can lead to serious water borne disease.”
He appealed for urgent intervention from government and aid organizations to save the thirsty residents because according to him many petitions to the near bankrupt District Assembly for assistance have been unsuccessful.
The Karaga district has high number of children dying yearly of malnutrition due to abject poverty and an outbreak of deadly water borne disease will cause humanitarian crisis.
