The first national sanitation summit
was convened yesterday to start drawing up a "people's plan for sanitation
and dignity".
The service delivery protests that
happen almost every day across the country have been described as a
"ticking time bomb" by Professor Peter Alexander from the University
of Johannesburg, with an estimated 16 million South Africans lacking proper
sanitation.
Pregs Govender, deputy chairperson of
the SA Human Rights Commission, slammed the City of Cape Town for building open
toilets without thinking of the dignity of those who had to use them.
"Eventually, these toilets were
enclosed not just because of a ruling from the SAHR but because of what
everyone did together," said Govender, who urged communities to stand
together to define constitutional rights such as dignity
Govender added that the SAHRC was
interested in engaging communities about access to water, as it "is not
possible to live properly on the 25 litres of water a day" government had
allocated to poor people.
The summit attracted delegates from
informal settlement organisations and civil society with the aim of developing
a "people's plan for sanitation and dignity that will build on and
support, struggles by communities throughout South Africa", according to
Phumeza Mlungwana, general secretary of the Social Justice Coalition.
"When we live without services,
our dignity is undermined. Diseases such as TB, diarhhoea and HIV are
perpetrated by our living conditions," lamented Bandile Mdlalose from
Abahlali baseMjondolo shackdwellers' organisation.
"When winter comes we know there
are shack fires and you have to make sure your funeral policy is up-to-date
because you don't know whether you will still be alive in December," she
added.
"The biggest problem is that we
accept the things we should not accept. If we keep quiet about rights that are
in the Constitution, in another 20 years' time, we will come back and preach
the same thing,"said Mdlalose.
If we keep quiet about rights that are
in the Constitution, in another 20 years' time, we will come back and preach
the same thing,"
Meanwhile, Joconia Rahube accused
officials in Madibeng municipality in the North West of having no interest in
fixing broken water infrastructure as they were profiting from the private
water trucks that delivered water to the areas.
Rahube's brother, Osiah, was shot dead
by police during a water protests in Madibeng in January.
Anglican Archbishop Thabo Makgoba
praised the SJC for convening the summit, saying that we needed to "go
back to the Constitution to ensure that the values of equality, dignity and
justice" were upheld.
"You are raising painful issues.
What is the content of dignity? What is the content of justice? If a city id
not delivering services, what should you do?" said Makgoba.
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