Buikwe, Jinja residents get sh2b piped water

Dec 22, 2011

BUJAGALI Energy Limited (BEL) in partnership with National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) on Wednesday commissioned a pipe water project that will benefit communities in the district of Jinja and Buikwe.

By Donald Kiirya

BUJAGALI Energy Limited (BEL) in partnership with National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) on Wednesday commissioned a pipe water project that will benefit communities in the district of Jinja and Buikwe.

The project was launched by the Buikwe district L.C 5 chairperson, Mathias Kigongo at Naminya village. Kigongo represented the Minister for Water and Environment, Maria Mutagamba.

According to BEL’s community Liaison team leader, Zakalia Lubega, the sh2.2 billion pipe water project will improve health and sanitation of over 2,000 households in nine villages in Jinja and Buikwe districts.

Lubega said the villages to benefit from the water project include Kikubamutwe, Malindi, Naminya Kiira, Buloba and Naminya resettlement in Buikwe district and Namizi west, Kyabirwa Bujagali and Ivunamba in Jinja district.

“The project is part of a comprehensive social and environmental mitigation program that seeks to restore and improve the livelihood of communities affected by the dam and which is concurrently implemented alongside the construction of Bujagali Hydro Power project,” Lubega noted.

He added that the project consist of over 36 kilometers of distribution pipes and 50 yard taps, plus service to some areas to a 10 cubic meter per hour pump station and a 50 cubic meter reservoir tank.

He said the project was implemented by Sumadhura Technologies and supervised by Joadah Consult, the project consultants.

“Apart from being approved by NEMA, the project had the blessing of the local communities and their leadership because it addresses a critical concern of prevalence of waterborne diseases for communities living around the project.”

“We have been running programs that promote health and hygiene in the communities and we have recorded great improvement in areas of health and sanitation but without clean water, the challenge of waterborne diseases is still very real. We are glad that this will now be greatly diminished,” Lubega noted. 

He said that apart from the water project, BEL has been involved in community programs like environmental conservation, livelihood restoration, skills training and agricultural improvement in nine villages along the East and West banks of river Nile where the Bujagali Hydropower Project is being constructed.

While commissioning the project, Kigongo cautioned residents to guard the facilities jealously so that they are not vandalized.
 
Kigongo urged residents to plant more trees as a way of protecting the environment.

He expressed concern over the high rate at which electric cables are being vandalized in the area and called upon local authorities to fight the vice.

“Government is losing and with this vandalizing of electric cables, we are killing our economy so we must act and fight it,” Kigongo noted.

Residents from the nine villages turned out in large numbers to witness the official commissioning of the pipe water project.

Residents said access to clean water had been a challenge to them for several years adding that many in the past have been depending on rainfall.  

Present at the function were BEL officials who included Glain Gaydar, the vive President of BEL, Kenneth Kaheru and Fredrick Gume.  

 

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