By Jacques Cambon
This article is part of a special issue on water and water privatisation in Africa produced as a joint initiative of the Transnational Institute, Ritimo and Pambazuka News. This special issue is also being published in French.
Despite UN recognition of access ‘to safe and clean drinking water and sanitation as a human right that is essential for the full enjoyment of life and all human rights,’ it is a right that is far from being realised in most parts of the world, writes Jacques Cambon.
On 29 July 2010, the General Assembly of the United Nations recognised, in a proposed resolution by Bolivia and adopted by 122 votes with 41 abstentions, ‘the right to safe and clean drinking water and sanitation as a human right that is essential for the full enjoyment of life and all human rights.’ The resolution also calls upon ‘states and international organizations to provide financial resources, capacity-building and technology transfer, in particular to developing countries’.
It was a historical decision. But what explains the need to proclaim this right is that it is barely respected around the world. According to the UNESCO/WHO 2010 report, 884 million people around the world (13 per cent of the world population), among whom 343 million are in Africa, do not have access to an ‘improved drinking water supply’ (running water network, public drinking fountains, protected wells or springs, rainwater tanks), and 2.6 billion people (39 per cent of the world population) do not have access to ‘improved sanitation systems’ (mains drainage, septic tanks, latrines). The consequences are tragic: To this day, water-borne diseases (diarrhoea, cholera, typhoid, polio, meningitis, hepatitis, etc) are the main cause of death in the world, killing 8 million people a year according to the NGO Solidarites International (and about 3 million as stated by the World Health Organization). The culprits behind the ‘water crisis’ are numerous: Climate, demography, lifestyles, economy, politics, institutions, and the like. It is imperative that all are eliminated, so this ‘right to clean drinking water’ can at last become a reality.