Potable water supply coverage in rural areas of Ethiopia in general and in Benishangul GumuzrnRegion in particular is very le.v. Although many governmental and non-governmen talrnorganizations have been involved in the provision of safe water supply in many parts of the countryrnas well as the region, the coverage still remains very low. The water supply coverage of BenishangulrnGumuz Region was 35.5% in 2004, of which 62.5% and 29.8% for urban and rural respectively. Inrnaddition to the low coverage, many of the water supply schemes previously constructed were notrnfunc tioning well. When we look the case in Bambasi Woreda, for example, out of the total existingrn110 water supply schemes, 45 (or about 41%) were nonfunctional in the year 2005. Thus, this studyrninvestigated the sustainability problem of rural water supply schemes in Benishangul GumuzrnRegion, particularly in Bambasi Woreda.rnThe community preferred Shallow Wells and Protected Springs to Hand Dug Wells for their reliablernwater sources. The study has confirmed that Hand dug wells fitted with Afridev pumps as a liftingrndevice, were the main sources of water in the Woreda. About 39% of the respondents were consultedrnover wa ter supply schemes technology selection. Unlike technology selection, majority of thernrespondents, 82%, were involved in water supply schemes site selection. Only 32.5% of thernrespondents made contributions during wnter supply schemes construction period. Community'srnstrong willingness to manage water supply schemes was observed in the study area and about 93%rnof the schemes were managed by locally esta blished Water Committees. Women are less representedrnand assigned for low level of responsibilities in Water Committees than men. Majority of therncommunity members (81.7%) did not get any kind of training opportu nities in relation to theirrnwater supply schemes. 58% of the Water Committee members trained for once. There was limitedrncommunities share in capital (inves tment) costs of water supply schemes. The money collected fromrnwater tariff did not cover the whole 0 & M expenses. Majority of the respond",ts (94.2%) werernsatisfied on existing water supply schemes construction qLwlity, however, observations indicated thatrnsome schemes which were constructed by contractors and government offices had poor quality,rnmainly due to poor constmction supervision and lack of commitment among experts to work in ruralrnareas. Many schemes failed freque ntly and took longer period of maintenance. The study foundrnexistence of unsatisfactory external support from and coordination among different stakeholders inrnthe provision and management of water supply schemes in the Woreda.