Marib – Hosting over 5,000 families, Al Jufainah Camp in Marib city is Yemen’s largest displacement site. For many of the camp’s residents, collecting enough water to sustain their families was a daily struggle. The increasing spread of communicable diseases, like cholera and more recently COVID-19, makes this lack of access to safe water even more dangerous.

“Twelve months ago, most people had to spend a lot of money buying or borrowing water from neighbours,” said Waleed, a displaced person living in Al Jufainah Camp, who worked as a water point monitor with the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

European Union Humanitarian Aid partnered with IOM to improve water access in Al Jufainah Camp. IOM worked side by side with camp representatives to develop a plan for emergency water trucking and to establish 27 water points bringing chlorinated water that’s safe for drinking and handwashing to over 4,000 displaced families in the camp.

New water points and water delivery is not where the support stopped. To keep the water points filled and functioning, IOM’s water and sanitation team in Marib trained over 80 camp residents as water point monitors — some of whom were given future training as hygiene promoters to raise awareness among their neighbours on how to effectively combat COVID-19 and cholera.

Waleed was one of the key members of the water point monitoring team. Originally from Raymah governorate, he fled with his family to Marib city at the start of the conflict. Soon after, he was injured and lost his left leg. Unable to work, he could no longer afford to rent a house in Marib city, so he had to move with his wife and six children to Al Jufainah Camp.

“I was asked to supervise and record the water trucking times, the amount of water delivered, clean the tank and make sure that no one is wasting water,” Waleed explained.

Waleed used his first salary payment to cover his septic tank, as he had been worried that one of his children might fall in while playing.

Norah worked alongside Waleed on the water monitoring point team. When she fled with her family from Ibb to Marib, her husband’s heart condition worsened, and he was no longer able to work. Norah became the sole breadwinner of their small family.

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