Call from Zambia: Protect Water Rights

Zambia: WASH Forum calls for urban gov­ernance reforms, pro­tec­tion of water rights.

THE Zam­bia NGO WASH Forum has called for urgent reforms in urban gov­ernance and stronger invest­ment in water, san­it­a­tion, and hygiene (WASH) ser­vices, warn­ing that infra­struc­ture alone will not address grow­ing chal­lenges in the coun­try’s rap­idly expand­ing towns and cit­ies.

In a state­ment delivered dur­ing a high-level Urban WASH Gov­ernance Sem­inar in Lusaka, the forum has urged Gov­ern­ment and stake­hold­ers to adopt cli­mate-resi­li­ent solu­tions, strengthen account­ab­il­ity sys­tems, and pro­mote inclus­ive decision-mak­ing.

The forum, a con­sor­tium of 61 civil soci­ety organ­isa­tions, also advoc­ated for the con­sti­tu­tional recog­ni­tion of the Human Right to Water and San­it­a­tion and the right to a clean, healthy and sus­tain­able envir­on­ment.

Forum Coordin­ator Bubala Muy­ovwe -Mumba said recent shocks have exposed deep vul­ner­ab­il­it­ies in urban ser­vice deliv­ery sys­tems.

“The fra­gil­ity of urban sys­tems was laid bare by the 2024 drought emer­gency, which exposed the com­pound­ing risks of rapid urban growth, cli­mate shocks, and under-resourced gov­ernance,” Ms Muy­ovwe -Mumba said in a speech read by Head of Admin­is­tra­tion and Fin­ance, Zama Lungu-banda.

She noted that while offi­cial stat­ist­ics may sug­gest rel­at­ively high urban water cov­er­age, the real­ity for many res­id­ents espe­cially in informal set­tle­ments remains dire.

“Safely man­aged san­it­a­tion and reli­able, con­tinu­ous water ser­vices remain out of reach for many, par­tic­u­larly those liv­ing in informal and peri-urban areas,” Ms Muy­ovwe-mumba said.

“These gaps trans­late dir­ectly into ill­ness, lost school days, and indig­nity for women, chil­dren, and per­sons with dis­ab­il­it­ies.” She stressed that access to water and san­it­a­tion must be treated as a fun­da­mental right rather than a mar­ket com­mod­ity.

The Forum also high­lighted the import­ance of part­ner­ships in advan­cing WASH gov­ernance, pay­ing trib­ute to the Local Gov­ern­ment Asso­ci­ation of Zam­bia and Wat­eraid Zam­bia for con­ven­ing the sem­inar, and not­ing the sup­port of the Water Voices United ini­ti­at­ive.

Accord­ing to the Forum, the Water Voices United project co-fun­ded by the European Union and Dan­ish People’s Aid and imple­men­ted by SNV Neth­er­lands Devel­op­ment Organ­isa­tion in part­ner­ship with the WASH Forum aims to strengthen civil soci­ety par­ti­cip­a­tion in water gov­ernance and sup­port equit­able ser­vice deliv­ery.

Source: Daily Nation