Jamam refugee camp , South Sudan ( CNN ) -- The dried up cattle pond is only a few meters off the red road that runs through Jamam refugee camp . It 's a huge hole in the ground , long emptied by the blazing sun . At the bottom of this pit women and children dig with cups and bowls in the smelly , spongy mud for the little dirty water that seeps into their shallow wells . Jamam refugee camp is in a desperate situation . All day Oxfam trucks water from the very few working boreholes in or near the camp to tanks close to the road . Women wait in the heat for up to four hours twice a day , next to their long queues of buckets and jerry cans . Men with sticks and whips police the lines . Fights break out all the time . No one has to ask why . There is simply not enough water and we are running out of options and we are running out of time . This is the daily struggle that is the human face of peace failing in the Sudans . The conflict in Blue Nile has been going on for months , and now in the past few weeks fighting between Sudan and South Sudan threatens to further destabilize the wider border region these refugees still live in . Like a cruel reminder of the conflict that the refugees fled , unidentified Antonovs -- the kind of planes that bombed their villages in Blue Nile -- flew over Jamam camp three times in the past few weeks . In a panic , refugees ran and sought safety in holes in the ground . To truly understand why peace is so important , the world needs to remember it 's not just the fighting that matters but also the enormous suffering it causes those who have already been forced to flee it . The interrupted lives , deadened by displacement in the hot , unblinking heat . In barely established camps like Jamam there 's nothing to do but wait . In Jamam -- where water is rationed well below people 's needs , enough only for cooking and bathing - that struggle has become a crisis that is about to deepen as the rainy season approaches . How to get enough water ? That is the burning question , but the ground here has few answers . There is just not enough water to cope with so many new people -- and now there are fears that more may arrive as conflict spreads . We 've done a hydro-geological survey and we 've drilled for new boreholes . We have even resorted to water divining -- a traditional method using metal rods in the hope of detecting ground water . Only one drill has produced any water , but very little . We were completely reliant on four overworked boreholes pumping 22 hours a day . One of these collapsed last week , and now there are just three . Rationing has been tightened again . It was a grim evening in our base in the camp that night . We ate our meal to the loud hum of the generator with our hearts in our stomachs . The refugees were settled here partly because the host community was welcoming . But as water sources run out or dry up and more and more refugees arrive , competition for water is beginning to cause conflict here too . Fights break out at water points . The pressure is intense and I fear it will get worse . The heavy rains are coming , bringing fresh problems . It rained last week for three hours , long enough to destroy many of the flimsy shelters of plastic sheeting , sheets , or straw the refugees have constructed under trees . Whole families were left exposed . The rains will flood large parts of the camp , bringing the threat of disease and making trucking water in very difficult -- perhaps impossible as the roads deteriorate into impassable mud slicks . Drilling in the rains is also near impossible . It is hard to express how miserable the mud of Upper Nile is . It 's a kind of black clay that sticks to everything , the stuff of quagmires . Largely impermeable , water sits on top of it , a massive health risk not just encouraging malaria but also water-borne diseases including cholera . Humanitarian agencies working in the camp are looking into options including relocating a large number of the refugees to a new site , and putting in a pipeline that will hopefully mean the water can reach the camp more reliably when the roads fall apart . But there 's only one real solution . People need peace and people need to be able to go home . Unless all parties involved in the fighting stop and focus on long-term peace then I fear that the situation in Sudan and South Sudan will reverse to how it was during wartime , Africa 's longest civil war , the most recent phase of which lasted 22 years and left around 2 million people dead . All that progress made in the years following the 2005 peace agreement risks being lost . The international community played a major role in brokering that peace -- now is the time to make sure it lasts . The people in Jamam , and across the two countries , deserve to be free from the constant threat of crisis . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Pauline Ballaman .
Hundreds of thousands of refugees have fled conflict in Sudan , South Sudan border region . Many have taken shelter in Jamam camp , but water supplies are running low . Score: 6 Ballaman : `` People need peace , and to be able to go home ''