Rehabilitation Project
Our partner in the field has provided the following report about the village of Kyabalere and the project...
Kyabalere village is located in Kikamulo sub county, Nakaseke District. The district has a population of 184,000 (2011 survey) of which 92600(51%) are males and 92,200 (49%) are females. The District is also part of the Luwero triangle where the guerrilla war that brought the current ruling government to power took place.
The village lies 2.5km from the Kiwoko town council which is the nearest business town in the area. Kyabalere village has 159 households with 596 people. The village has two zones namely Kyabalere and Nakaswa zones. Kyabalere zone is where the well is being constructed and has a population of 252 people with about 62 (25%) children below the age of five. The population is fully involved in agriculture as their main source of income where emphasis is put on growing cassava and sweet potatoes as their main cash crop. They also mentioned planting Matooke some years back but were forced to abandon it because banana wilt has destroyed so many acreages of plantations. Pigs chickens, goats and cows are also reared but on small scale. Another way the community is raising funds to improve household income is through formation of village saving and credit schemes where community members are encouraged to join so that they can access funds for household income projects and by so doing can raise funds for the children’s school fees and other household basic requirements
Kyabalere village has one protected hand dug well located almost at the boarder of Kyabalere zone and Nakaswa zone and about 2km away from where the new site is being constructed. This well was constructed by the district however the well has a low yield and could not sustain the whole population in the village especially during the dry season. With this kind of hardship the community through their local leaders wrote an application which was then forwarded to our office for consideration.
Progress:
31/5/2012 – a first village meeting was held by Lydia (CDO) to try and inform the community members about the project. The meeting was also intended to develop a plan for the activities that were to be carried out to ensure that well is constructed. The meeting was attended by the Local leaders like the LC 1 chairperson and other committee members. In the chairman’s communication he thanked Busoga Trust for considering their application and encouraged the members to fully participate in the construction until the well is completed. He said that the community has suffered a lot due to absence of enough water in the area, the existing well that was constructed by the district has a low yield and the water was not sufficient for the whole community. In that meeting a water and sanitation committee was selected and a date set for its training
5/6/2012 – the technical supervisor Dan, Lydia (CDO) in the presence of the community members carried out a reconnaissance survey in the village in order to identify a suitable area for the well construction and immediately after siting, construction work started. The technician posted on this site was Sekate who had moved along with his helper and the rest of the team
6/6/2012 – Lydia (CDO) with support of a student on internship (Ester) trained the water user committee so that their capacity in mobilising the water users is enhanced. The training started at 2:00pm after the community had come back from their gardens and lasted for about 2 hours. Later a baseline survey was started on. She also visited the site and excavation had reached 19ft.
8/6/2012 – Lydia and Ester visited the community to promote good hygiene and sanitation habits where they carried out hand washing demo that erecting a hand washing facility they then continued with the baseline survey and this was done with support of the village health team (VHT). The VHT is a local technical structure that was formed and trained by government to mobilise and sensitise the communities on matters of health. They moved from house to house taking records of the current status of the households. They later moved to the site to ensure that the construction exercise is going on well. The well had reached 28ft deep and there was no water yet.
13/6/2012 – the technical supervisor went to the site for supervision and found work going on well. Excavation had reached 42ft deep with some water of about 1ft. the community was still vigilant and fully supporting the technician. The well was being brick lined to avoid caving since the formation was somehow soft and had reached the water bearing zone
20/6/2012 – the technical supervisor visited the site as part of his routine supervision exercises. The site had reached a depth of 51ft with a re-charge rate of 1.5ft/hr and an over night water column of 14ft. however the formation at the bottom was characterised with running mud making it difficult to excavate further. It was agreed to stop further excavation and concentrate on finishing with the brick work at the top and construction of the sanitary seal. Hygiene and sanitation follow-ups were also carried out by Lydia to try and encourage the community members to put up the required sanitary facilities
28/6/2012 – We visited the site and found when it had been covered with a slab and pump base,making some final finishing on the apron. The site was also being cleared of waste construction materials and levelling of the surroundings plus fencing of the site.
6/7/2012 – the supervisor visited the site and verified the source had been completed and properly fenced. The community was then told to wait for the installation that will be done sometime this week. Lydia and the interns (Ester, Aisha and Deborah) also made some follow-ups in the house holds to ensure the right facilities were put in place.
