Eorr Emayian

The community at Eorr Emayian has been working for decades to achieve clean water. The community lives in hilly area between two rivers running north to south, and women travel down hill to one of two intermittent rivers, walking 5-10 per trip, sometimes twice a day to bring back water in 20 liter jugs. Women carry these jugs uphill again by strapping them to their foreheads and supporting them on their backs; these straps over time dig grooves into women’s skulls and erode their spines, causing painful and permanent disabilities. The water is typically polluted by agriculture to the north, and especially in dry seasons can become stagnant. MERC estimates that one-out-of ten persons in Eorr Emayian suffers from cholera, trachoma or other water borne diseases as a result. These conditions were reported by women in the community and compiled into a Report produced by Prescott College students.

After years of gathering funds, the community was able to pay for a geological water survey. They brought the positive results of this survey to the attention of MERC. The Project involved drilling a deep borehole well near the community of Eorr Enkitok, equipping it with an electrical submersible pump powered by nearby powerlines, and distributing water to the community through a 10 km pipeline and a system of tanks and kiosks. This distribution system will service at least seven schools, an orphanage, two clinics, and three village public areas. Partners in this project are Rotary Districts 7670 and 5490 in North Carolina and Arizona in the U.S., Rotary Club of Naivasha, Kenya, East African Rotary District 9212, and Rotary International. Prescott College students undertook research in 2014 into the need for water in this place through interviews with communities members. The project will ultimately provide a borehole and distribution system to a community of 7500 people and two schools.

The project has a much longer time to complete than other similar projects, and is near that point today with the borehole successfully built, the infrastructure completed, and the only step remaining to be hooking the system up to power and completing the training.

Chairman Kisuna has been tireless in his efforts to bring this project to fruition.