ReliefWeb

Justine Asifiwe, 21, was preparing dinner for her children when she heard shouts growing louder outside. Stepping out into the commotion she was stunned to see flames approaching from the distance, as red, hot lava poured down the sides of Mt Nyiragongo towards Goma.

Grabbing her two young children, she joined crowds fleeing towards the Rwandan border. That night, lava caused through her neighbourhood, leaving a trail of destruction.

“All my belongings were burnt in the house,” she told Mercy Corps from a site hosting more than a thousand displaced families not far from her home in the Bushara quarter, in Goma’s north.

Justine was among the first to return to the neighbourhood, leaving her young children with friends and travelling back to check on the damages, despite the ongoing risk of toxic gases.

"When we came back, we started by touring the neighbourhood. For us, the first thing that we wanted to check on was Mercy Corps’ water [infrastructure]. That's how we saw that the big tapstand and the big reservoir had been affected by the lava," said Justine.

Although the lava flow stopped short of Goma’s city centre, damage to the Bushara neighbourhood, home to a 5,000m³ water reservoir and a major water supply pipeline, had immediate knock-on effects for the rest of the city.

“More than 550,000 people were immediately cut-off from water, amounting to more than a quarter of the city” said IMAGINE programme Director, Tom Mosquera, who led Mercy Corps’ initial assessments of the damages.

The reservoir was one of two constructed by Mercy Corps through the IMAGINE program, financed by the British Government; in March 2021, both reservoirs, along with 105 km of water pipes and 185 tap-stands were handed over to the authorities of South and North Kivu to bring clean water to 1.1 million people in the cities of Goma and Bukavu.

The program also saw the reduction of diarrhea, the second most common cause of death in children under five in DRC, from 13.3% in February 2016 to 5% in February 2021, through providing both the means and hygiene knowledge for women to keep their families safe.

But more than one month after the eruption, the risks of water-borne diseases, diarrhea and cholera run high, as more than 400,000 people return to Goma following the lifting of mandatory evacuation orders.

Justine and her family are among those that have been affected by the water shortages.

"Before this volcanic eruption, Mercy Corps had installed tap stands for us. Having water so close to our house brought many benefits. My family was able to fill six jerry cans of water each day which we used for washing, cooking and even bathing the children. We were really happy to have water. But now we don't have it anymore," said Justine.

"My first child had diarrhoea and one of my friends is now in hospital with her sick child. It's all due to the lack of water," she said.

Despite temporary solutions put in place to reconnect pipelines to a number of affected neighbourhoods, damages to the Bushara reservoir mean less water availability for communities with functioning tapstands. As a result, some families are resorting to drawing water from Lake Kivu and other contaminated sources.

“Currently, there is not enough water. I have seen people jostling just to get access to water. Some people spend the whole day at the fountain queuing up to get water," said 42-year-old, mother of eight, Madeleine Kabuo, as she leaned over to fill a water drum from the lake in Himbi quarters’ plage du peuple.

“We didn’t even have water to wash ourselves with this morning, that's why I came here to get water from the lake," said Madeleine, who fled to her eldest daughter's house after her home in Majengo was engulfed in flames on the night of the eruption. "If there is no water, how can we wash our clothes? How can the children wash themselves? It is very difficult for us, no one can live without water,” she added.

The crisis comes at the worst possible time for the people of Goma, as the country enters its third wave of COVID‑19 and cases spike nationwide. Without consistent access to water for handwashing, COVID‑19 cases, which sat at 3,404 in the province and 43,019 nationally as of 7 July, continue to rise.

To avert a secondary health crisis, Mercy Corps is working with the authorities and other humanitarian actors to provide communities in Goma with urgent, temporary water supplies, while seeking permanent solutions to repair the damaged infrastructure.

With the generous support of the Latter-day Saint Charities and The Starbucks Foundation, Mercy Corps is set to carry-out repairs to the Bushara reservoir, which suffered damages to its outer concrete walls due to the lava spread. Mercy Corps is currently conducting an assessment of the lava damage to the reservoir and on this basis will initiate the necessary and appropriate repair works. These repairs will be crucial to restoring permanent water supplies to the northern parts of the city and accompany activities led by Virunga National Park and other partners to rebuild damaged pipelines.

Starting in mid-July, Mercy Corps will be trucking water to the Kibati, Buvira, Bujovu, and Kahembe neighbourhoods, to provide more than 143,000 people with daily water supplies, ensuring families like Justine’s have a help in hand until the permanent water network is restored.

“Water is essential for life. It is absolutely our priority,” said-Justine, who continues to advocate for her community.

Mercy Corps has been working in the DRC since 2007, empowering the most vulnerable Congolese people to overcome hardships and build resilience in the face of one of the world's most urgent humanitarian crises. DRC has 5.2 million internally displaced people, the second highest number in the world, and more than 19.6 million people in need of humanitarian assistance. The volcanic eruption brings further disruptions to livelihoods and stands to worsen current humanitarian needs. Last year, Mercy Corps reached 3.7 million people in the Democratic Republic of Congo.