In the whole district of Kisoro, only 44% of the total population has access to safe water with (43% rural and 57% urban) which explains a big gap that still exists in the district. The district has only 2 pumped water schemes sourced from Chuho and supplies and the current Nkanka water project which has not taken shape, this means that almost all parts of Kisoro Town Council, some parts of Nyarusiza, Muramba and Nyakabande sub-counties depend on this Chuho water Scheme. This explains why incidences of cholera, dysentery and other water related diseases outbreaks are common in the district.

The situation is even worse for sub-counties like Nyarusiza, Chahi, Nyakabande and Bukimbiri where water access levels still range between 11% and 13%. Kabiranyuma, a swamp that lies between Muhabura and Mgahinga volcanoes at an altitude of 10,000 feet used to provide water through gravity and serve the sub-counties of Nyarusiza, Muramba and Chahi; however the scheme is not functional at the moment. Rukeri Batwa Community is thus located in Nyarusiza Sub County whose water coverage is 11%, this implies that the stuation for the batwa is uphaling and need urgent attention. As a way of providing short term remedy to this water crisis, our organisation equipped each house with a 500 litres plastic rain water harvesting tank which is still not sufficient.

This area below Mount Muhabura is located on high altitude, has no natural source of water, the only one that exists is Kyabiranyuma water flow scheme which is located with in the forest and its prohibited for people to enter. Some Batwa who forced themselves in the forest have been killed while others were arrested. During dry season, a jerry can of water costs between 2000 and 5000 Uganda shillings which is above 1$ and is difficult for the indigenous batwa to afford this since they don’t have any source of income.

Dry season starts in the months of May up to late September and thus hits hard the indigenous batwa who have to struggle while looking for both food and water. We would like to appeal to those who would like to partner with our organisation in making sure that the Batwa have access to clean water and their school children have water and look clean while at school to contact us and make their donation.