In the capital Juba, the sound of rain usually carries a refreshing promise of brief relief from the characteristic searing hot sun. In Bentiu, it means danger.

For the past five years, the town in Unity, South Sudan, has been severely impacted by flooding which has left around 300,000 people stranded on a sliver of land surrounded by 4,500 square kilometers of floodwaters.

In partnership with local authorities, humanitarians and local communities, Pakistani peacekeeping engineers, serving with the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), are working tirelessly to protect this little bit of land.

Their efforts include building and maintaining a vast network of over 80 kilometers of dykes and berms and protecting the local airstrip, which is a crucial entry point for humanitarian aid and other essential commodities. Their efforts are making a tangible difference to the lives of local communities as, compared to 2020, when a massive overflow from a swelling Nile River swept across the town, residents can now at least live in some sense of normalcy.

“People are now living safely and not in the water. As you can see, the water has left this area,” says Solomon Yain, leader of the local camp for displaced families.

But as the rainy season looms, the threat of the dykes being breached grows.

When the rains came last year, floodwaters reached 30cm below the dykes. Since then, the Pakistani peacekeepers have worked relentlessly to raise them by at least one and a half meters, to prevent incidents, such as in 2022, when a rupture of the western wall threatened the safety of civilians as well as the UNMISS field office.

The engineers are supported by peacekeeping colleagues from the Mongolian battalion, who provide protection while they’re working as well as patrolling the dykes to check for breaches and other hazards.