Saving Uganda’s water thirsty cities

Mar 24, 2021

River Rwizi in western Uganda used to be a stable and reliable source of water. Today, Rwizi lives between two extremes. During the rainy season, Rwizi causes floods and reduces to trickles in the dry season. As Mbarara city drowns in a water crisis, Mbale, Gulu and Arua have not been spared. Gerald Tenywa engaged citizens in four cities about water security.

River Manafwa which supplies Mbale city is choking on silting caused mainly by human activities such as sand mining. Such activities should be regulated for rivers to remain ‘alive’.

Gerald Tenywa
Journalist @New Vision

In a makeshift settlement known as Kasanyalaze in Mbarara city, Jaduress Kayongo, a resident, has seen the good and bad times of River Rwizi.

As a youthful girl, Kayongo says Rwizi was beautiful and calm as it served Mbarara with water. In her 50s, Kayongo says Rwizi has become aggressive during the rainy season, causing floods that have become a frequent nightmare in the low-lying areas of the city.

She also says during the dry season, Rwizi becomes lifeless and does not give enough water to Mbarara.

“We have to give up other things to buy water for bathing, washing home utensils and maintaining good sanitation and hygiene,” she says.

As the dry season settles on Mbarara, Kayongo says she has to part with sh1,000 for 20 litres of water as opposed to sh50 for the same amount of water as recommended by the National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC).

“Most of the time, the water prices are hiked,” Kayongo says, adding that this is because they depend on vendors who collect water from River Rwizi. “The water hyacinth has also reduced the water in Rwizi.”

Also, the scarcity of water is exposing girls from poor families to risks, including sexual assault when they go to fetch water from River Rwizi.

John Semujju, the LC1 chairperson of Kasanyalaze, says water shortage has many effects on human lives; both directly and indirectly. “The most vulnerable and the poorest are the most affected.”

Once there is no a reliable source of water, people will go for any water.

“This is what is happening in Mbarara and water consumers face water-borne diseases,” Semujju says.

Besides Mbarara city, Rwizi provides water to livestock and farmland as it flows across 10 districts from Buhweju to Lake Victoria.

Apart from vulnerable women such as Kayongo, the Mbarara water crisis has not spared the mighty. The investments such as Nile Breweries and Century Bottling Company that set up factories in Mbarara about a decade ago have also suffered from water insecurity.

This is because they do not get as much water as they want during the dry season, meaning that they have to produce below capacity.

“We have to ration water during the dry season because it is not enough,” Louis Mugisha, the team leader for Lake Victoria Water Management Zone in the Ministry of Water and Environment, says.

SILTING MAJOR CAUSE

In eastern Uganda, the residents of Mbale city are not any luckier than their counterparts of Mbarara. River Manafwa, which supplies the sprawling city, delivers more silt than water to the residents of Mbale.

In a manner similar to the destruction of Rwizi, Arua city in West Nile also gets more silt than water from River Enyau.

Water thirsty cities

Water thirsty cities

The catchment of the river has also been disfigured by sand miners, bricklayers, expansive agricultural activities, charcoal burning and human settlements. As a result, Enyau’s water is reducing and the people who are underserved with water are growing by the day.

The biting shortage has also not spared northern Uganda’s city, Gulu. The population is always on the tenterhooks. As the last drops of the rainy season dry up from the ground, the water supplies to the city decline. This is because the demand for water is increasing, yet the catchment of Oyitino dam, the source of Gulu’s water, is also under intensive destruction.

HOW DID CITIES RUN OUT OF WATER?

The warning sign that all was not well became visible about three decades ago. The water bodies, including lakes, rivers and streams, started turning brown, an indication that they were being silted.

In recent years, the lakes started shrinking and the rivers flowed with a much smaller stream during the dry season. In some cases, rivers and streams have become seasonal.

“As the cities are being created, we are realising that there is water scarcity in urban areas,” Dr Callist Tindimugaya, a commissioner in the water ministry, says.

This is because water running through the four cities is tied with the catchment of Rwizi for Mbarara, Manafwa in Mbale, Oyitino dam in Gulu and River Enyau in Arua, Tindimugaya explains.

Also, the catchments of Rwizi, Manafwa, Oyitino dam and Enyau are similar to umbilical cords. Once the stores (wetlands and forests) of water in the catchment stay alive, the rivers will also remain alive and the cities’ population will blossom. However, when the catchments are destroyed, the cities get starved of water.

In some cases, the wetlands have been taken over by individuals driven by greed.

“We know of some cases where the river has been diverted from its course,” Mugisha says.

He also says the diversion of the river takes place where people bend the law.

“It is about negligence and the poor enforcement of the laws and regulations that manage the environment,” Mugisha says, adding that the laws should be implemented without fear or favour.

REMEDIES

As a way out, the Government, communities, private sector and civil society organisations are working on a long-term approach to restore the degraded environment. This is part of what is being undertaken under what is known as Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM), where the users of water, policymakers and implementers collectively make decisions regarding water.

“What we have done is put people at the centre of managing water. We have to monitor the water resources together with the people, identify the issues and get solutions. We make management plans and the water ministry mobilises resources,” Mugisha says.

He adds: “We need to regulate bricklaying, sand mining, farming and charcoal burning. How can we do it?

“The enforcement never works because people never appreciate. We want self-enforcement, that is, how to link the impact of people’s activities and their health and how it affects the economy.”

The water ministry has decentralised by taking most of its staff to regional set-ups known as water management zones. These are Lake Victoria in Mbarara (western and southern Uganda), Lake Kyoga in Mbale (eastern Uganda), Lake Albert (for western, central and mid-western Uganda) in Fort Portal as well as Upper Nile in Lira (northern Uganda and West Nile).

In addition, the local governments in 10 districts sitting in the catchment of Rwizi are part of the Rwizi catchment committee. This has brought decision making relating to water and associated water resources such as wetlands, forests and river banks closer to the people.

Also, the Government is looking at getting water from different catchments to feed the new cities.

For instance, River Kagera is being considered as an alternative source of water. Mbale is looking at River Mpologoma or Kyoga as an alternative source of water for Mbale. Gulu is considering pumping water from River Nile at Karuma as a source of water.

WILL THIS WORK?

River Kagera is also suffering from heavy siltation; the reason its water dwindles during the dry season. Secondly, the cost of water is going to be immense for the consumers.

Thirdly, the piped water from Kagera can only help people in urban areas, meaning the farmers spread out in the catchment will not benefit.

“The solution is taking water from River Kagera but at what cost?” Mugisha says. He adds: “We have to look at the sustainable management of the river to secure the flow of water throughout the year.”

Also, Uganda has to engage the different countries on shared rivers such as Kagera.

“It is important to share information so that water abstraction does not have detrimental effects on other countries sharing the river,” Mugisha says.

This is part of IWRM, which the countries under the Nile Basin Initiative are using to manage River Nile sustainably.

RESTORATION

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) with funding from Nile Breweries Limited is constructing tanks for harvesting water which can be used for agriculture in Rwampara distirct. They are targeting construction of water tanks for 400 households.

In addition, encroachers who vacated Kitigani swamp in Rwampara are being encouraged to plant indigenous trees in the areas lying in the vicinity of the wetland.

Other swamps restored include Nyaruteme in Rwampara and Ihoho, sitting between Ntungamo district and Rwampara.

Another drive by WWF has provided former encroachers with start-up capital of sh500m to support a SACCOS in Rwampara.

In neighbouring Sheema, wetlands are also being resuscitated. Here, the water ministry has provided a revolving fund to the communities so that former encroachers can secure alternative livelihood outside the swamp.

District authorities are also constructing water and conservation structures on their land to ensure that their soil is not washed away.

“The fish that had disappeared is coming back. People are harvesting grass in the wetland which they use to mulch their gardens,” he says, explaining that the   Nyakambu wetland, which is the source of the grass, had previously been taken up by one individual.

BIG POPULATION, CLIMATE CHANGE BITING HARD

For Ibrahim Lubuye, a resident of Kakyeka, the big population has stolen the virginity of the landscape in Mbarara city.

In his neighbourhood, there were less than 10 houses about 40 years ago with a lot of greenery. Today, there are hundreds of houses that have swallowed up the landscape between Kakyeka and Rwizi in a manner similar to predators.

Lubuye says: “We have people being attracted by the amenities in the city and those seeking employment here.

This is partly behind the disappearance of the greenery.” Onesmus Mugyenyi, the deputy executive director of Advocates Coalition for Development and Environment (ACODE), says the rising population in the districts sharing the catchment of Rwizi is working against the river.

ACODE is one of the civil society organisations working with different partners to restore the catchment of River Rwizi.

“What we are seeing is an attack on the forests and wetlands which store the water during the rainy season,” Mugyenyi says, adding that with the disappearance of the stores of water, the river runs down quickly, causing floods downstream.

He also says ecological systems such as wetlands and forests shield the population from the adverse effects of the changing climate such as floods, drought or dry spells. This means that people are more resilient when the ecological systems are healthy and they become vulnerable to impacts of climate change.

Climate change is also driving people to invade wetlands. As the dry season hits parts of western Uganda, the wetlands are the only reservoirs of water where crops can thrive.

This has made the chain of wetlands in the catchment of River Rwizi vulnerable to invasion by farming communities.

In Mbarara city, industries are conveniently located to release effl uent into the river.

“River Rwizi fl ows through Mbarara city, so it is easy for industries to discharge their waste in it,” Mugisha adds.

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