"Ramadan is very hard this year in the Comoros", Ali Moindjie, a local reporter told IslamOnline.net by phone, from the capital, Moroni.

"It started last week under a very oppressive heat but we have no water as the rains are late this year and the water tanks that each family has in its yard are empty.

"People have no water for cooking, neither to drink nor to wash."

Residents, particularly women, are reportedly moving from one village to another asking, an sometimes begging, for people who might still have water left in their tanks.

Others, who can afford it, send their jerry cans by truck to the capital Moroni where they are filled at public fountains and brought back.

In mosque, worshippers are performing Salatul-Istisqa' - a special prayer offered when seeking rain from Almighty Allah during times of drought.

In the Comoros, a group of islands at the northern mouth of the Mozambique Channel about two-thirds of the way between northern Madagascar and northern Mozambique, there are no reservoirs or dam to collect rainwater.

Villagers outside the capital and on the mountains, collect rainwater in concrete tanks they have build in their yards, which are usually covered with coconut leaves or old and corrugated iron sheets.

"This water, most of the time dirty and of a brownish color, is used for
every purpose - cooking and drinking also," said Rahmat Ben Ali, a local teacher.

This explains why many people, mostly children, suffer from all kinds of
diseases.

The lack of clean water supplies several cases of cholera have been reported in the island since October 19, with El-Maarouf village registering nine cases in five days.

The island’s only hospital is not even properly equipped to treat such cases, with the patients asked to buy their own serums.

Hospital officials said the patients came from Ngazidja, an island off the coast of Grand Comoros.

"This means the carrier of the disease is found almost everywhere and it wakes up casually", they said, adding that the majority of the population have no access to clean water supply.

"They just contend themselves with everything that resembles water, not even caring for their health."

Other sources said the authorities are aware of the situation prevailing in the island.

"A few of the leaders have mentioned the emergence of the disease October 28. Has to be seen now if measures are taken to stop the vibrio (the bacterium that causes cholera in humans) from propagating, like in the past", Moindjie said.

Others want to know if disinfection measures of the homes concerned have been executed.

They said this is the job of the Red Crescent and that of the Hygiene
Committees in the villages.

Experience has proved that these organizations take their own time to react "while the disease does not wait."

The local press has appealed to the population not to wait for a rise in the number of patients to take the measures needed to prevent the disease from spreading - starting with personal hygiene like washing hands before eating and after toilet and to avoid common meals.

"It is only through prevention that the ravages caused by cholera in 1998 and 2002 could be avoided", another journalist said.

In 2002, 700 cases were recorded and at least 4 percent of them died.

Prices

Because of the water shortage, prices of food products have jumped in the island - not only of vegetables produced locally but also of imported food.

"Rice is sold at 0.6 euro a kilo. The cheapest fish, tuna is being sold at 2.54 euro a kilo, which is beyond the reach of the people. The price of other products have (exceeded) the 3.04 euros", Moindjie said.

However, there is no problem of availability, where stalls in markets, at Mutsamudu and Ouani, full with vegetables, which Comorans are very fond of during Ramadan.

"But like every year, the vendors have increased the prices of their products during this period. In some places, the municipal police has intervened to regulate the prices", wrote Al-Watwan, a local daily.

The price of petrol also has gone up and people are queuing for a liter.