SANA, YEMEN — Aisha Sufi, a woman with tired eyes and nine children, waits for a water truck in a nation of drought.
She is one of an estimated 150,000 Yemenis who have left their villages this year bound for Sana, Yemen's capital, in search of basic needs. Water and jobs, for example, are increasingly scarce in rural regions where many populations have quadrupled since the 1980s.
"It's not good here or there, but it's better to be here," said Sufi, who lives in the Hoshaishiya neighborhood of Sana. "There, in the village, is nothing. No rain, no modern facilities, nothing to help you at all."
The migration wave -- Sana's population of 2 million is growing about 8% a year -- has overwhelmed job markets and overstretched services. The unrelenting pressure is likely to make Sana the first capital in the world to run out of drinking water -- as early as 2025, according to a recent projection by the Sana Water Basin Management Project, which is funded by the World Bank.
The water crisis, which officials say requires additional wells and water mains to service the growing city, has for the most part been lost among this nation's many other problems. Yemen has been battling Shiite Muslim rebels in the north and a separatist movement in the south and is contending with a resurgence of Al Qaeda and the scourge of piracy in the Gulf of Aden. It is the poorest Arab country, yet remains a strategic ally in the U.S. fight against terrorism.
In Hoshaishiya, most residents are recent arrivals. Rebar sprouts from the tops of buildings still under construction, and sun-bleached trash is scattered over unpaved streets. Power failures are a daily occurrence.
To Sufi, her husband, and their children, who came from the village of Juban, access to clean water is the most pressing concern. The average person in Yemen survives on one-fifth of what the World Health Organization considers to be an adequate amount of water.
Like 60% to 70% of Sana residents, Sufi relies on privately owned tanker trucks, which draw water from wells around the region. There is no enforced standard for potable water and the quality varies widely.
Those who cannot afford to pay for water delivery or for jugs of clean water at corner stores, which costs 20 to 60 cents a gallon, collect free water every day from spigots outside mosques. It's not uncommon to see women navigating the labyrinthine streets of the Old City, water in their pink plastic buckets sloshing onto their black robes.
