Lack of water puts women and girls at risk
THERE is an increasing phenomenon in the world, a tall order of extraordinary proportions that seeks to reverse the gains and the foundation laid by our forebears in the quest to emancipate women and young girls. Our pervasive enemy is called “sextortion”.
The International Association of Women Judges describes sextortion as “the pervasive, but often ignored, form of sexual exploitation and corruption that occurs when people in positions of authority – whether government officials, judges, educators, law enforcement personnel, or employers – seek to extort sexual favours in exchange for something in their power to grant or withhold”.
Women, young girls, and people with disabilities are the most vulnerable to these acts at the hands of people entrusted with the responsibility of providing services or protecting them. During pandemics, wars, famine and droughts, these vulnerable groups are always at the receiving end.
Lack of basic services does not affect men as much, but it adversely affects women, young girls, and persons with disabilities in several ways and in turn they become victims of sextortion, rape and sexual assault.
The water and sanitation space has become fertile ground for those in pursuit of their self-serving acts at the expense of vulnerable groups. Women and young girls in unserved communities, particularly in rural areas, bear the brunt of fetching water at dawn or in dusk, and get exposed and end up being prey to the scavengers. Without dignified sanitation services, women and young girls have their dignity impaired when they have to relieve themselves in the bushes.
UN-Water says without safely managed water, sanitation, and hygiene services, women and girls are more vulnerable to abuse, attack and illhealth, affecting their ability to study, work and live in dignity.
A 2023 Joint Monitoring Programme by the World Health Organization and UN Children’s Fund shows continuing stark inequalities in access to water, sanitation, and hygiene, with a heavy burden falling on women and girls. It shows 2.2 billion people around the globe still lack safely managed drinking water, including 115 million people drinking surface water.
A total of 1.8 billion people still do not have drinking water on premises, and in two out of three households, women are primarily responsible for water collection. Moreover, 3.5 billion people still lack safely managed sanitation, including 419 million who practise open defecation.
This report notes that achieving universal coverage by 2030 will require a six-fold increase in current rates of progress for safely managed drinking water, and a five-fold increase for safely managed sanitation.
According to the General Household
Survey released by Statistics South Africa in 2022, 89% of South Africans have access to water while 84.1% have access to improved sanitation services across the country. Considering where the country is coming from, with the known imbalances of the past, our government has moved steadily in improving people’s lives for better.
This year, we are celebrating 30 years since the attainment of democracy, and acknowledge we have not moved at the speed at which we were supposed to have moved in ensuring universal access to clean water and dignified sanitation.
While the Department of Water and Sanitation has built and invested in bulk water infrastructure, such as dams, in line with its mandate, there have been shortcomings across the water value chain. This is particularly so, with proper planning at national level sometimes moving with much speed while the local sphere of government doesn’t always catch the train. This has been a litmus test for us in all three spheres of government, to move together with one speed.
Our ministry has been engaging the local sphere of government on a myriad issues, including to ensure that they are assisted with governance and technical capacity that will ensure that there is synergy at all levels.
It can’t be correct that we build and build, yet people still do not have access to water when their dams are full. We can’t still be crying about dilapidating infrastructure to this day, when we should be maintaining it, refurbishing, and upgrading it to cater for the needs of the communities we service.
Mistakes have been made; we are working to correct all these mistakes and in carrying this task, we are aware that others will not be happy with us entering their space, but we appeal for co-operation in efforts that will ensure water security for our country.
We have a huge responsibility on our shoulders to ensure that even those who do not enjoy water and sanitation services thus far, are also serviced in a manner consistent with our Constitution and the trust placed in us as people’s representatives.
The fact that we have sextortionists in our midst is because we have not served our people in the manner that we should have. We need to accelerate our pace in providing water and sanitation services to our people.
Once we do this, women and girls will not the bear the brunt of sex pests.