One of the major problems in the world today especially, in Africa is the scarcity ofrnwater resources. Ethiopia is one of African countries that are endowed with relativelyrnabundant water resources, but access to safe drinking water supplies in rural Ethiopiarnare among the lowest in sub-Saharan Africa. The same is lacking in most of rural areasrnof SNNPRS in general and Lemo woreda in particular. The general solution to waterrndemand problems had been more engineering oriented (supply oriented) where the idearnis always to increase supply by developing other source of water. The major objective ofrnthis research is to see sustainability of rural water supply schemes, and the specificrnobjectives are to see major technical and financial factors that affect rural water supplyrnschemes sustainability and the governance which also contribute to sustainability ofrnrural water supply schemes. In order to obtain the required information that meets thernobjectives of the study, I had selected 97 households' beneficiaries from five waterrnsupply schemes and four kebeles of the woreda. Data obtained from household surveyrnwere mainly analyzed quantitatively while data from FGD, KIf and physical observationrnwere analyzed qualitatively. The problems observed are: absence of local techniciansrnwho are responsible for technical aspects of the schemes; absence of availability ofrnspare parts for community as well as allocated budget for it; the problem of technologyrnselection for rural water supply schemes development; lack of transparency on financialrnmanagement system; lack of ability and willingness to pay for the services in some ofrnthe users beneficiaries; low capacity and skill for operation, maintenance, managementrnand governance of rural water supply by water committees and communities; lack ofrncommunity participation specifically, in the planning period absence of workingrnmanuals, guidelines and lack of incentives for water committees, and lack of awarenessrnfor sense of ownership, water management and governance at community level.rnTherefore, the findings call for the need to give attention in sustaining of the existingrnwater supply schemes by getting the solutions and/ or by taking measures to the statedrnand other related problems.