ACCESS TO CLEAN WATER IS A FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN RIGHT

 ACCESS TO CLEAN WATER IS A FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN RIGHT.

– By Festus Afofun

Water is life.

Water is important to the existence of human, which makes living a healthy life accurately depends on availability of water. The centrality of water to human living is made manifest in it’s use in key industries that drive human development starting from Energy ( more than 60 percent of energy generation and transmission requires utilization of water. e.g thermal souurces, nuclear, hydroelectric e.t.c.

Religion books and history teaches us more on importance of water. 

Water is so significant that Jesus established to his followers that he his the living water because he knows that he couldn’t have compared himself to any other thing which is not essential.

Revolutionary Fela Anikulapo Kuti the Afrobeat legend also compared himself with WATER which he said to be inevitable. 

There is a record according to BIBLE that WATER was in existence before earth, (Gen. 1:2, Psalm 24:24) Many more religious guru’s also testify to the importance and essentiality of WATER. 

Water is immensely important and very underestimated.

United Nations celebrates World Water Day which is observed annually on March 22nd every year majorly to raise awareness about the vital importance of water to safeguarding human security and maintaining the health of the planet’s ecosystems as well as advocating for sustainable management of water resources. 

The observance also aims at raising public awareness about many ways shifting atmospheric and oceanic conditions are reshaping the global hydrologic cycle.

Globally, 785 million people do not have access to a basic drinking-water service. And even for those who have access to the very resource on which a healthy, productive life is based on i.e WATER is not clean. 

In Nigeria today, 30 percent to 50 percent of rural water systems are nonfunctional within 20 years of being built, and utilities in urban areas often ration water servicing. e.g the town in which I resides (Ketu-Oluyomi Ota) presently had been in existence for over 400 years yet have never experience a community/public piped water system.

Abeokuta the capital of Ogun state Nigeria is also a glaring testimony of water deficiency. Same goes for Enugu, Onitsha and major parts of the northern Nigeria. 

Many communities lack access to “good” water because of government negligence. The Nigeria government has always been depriving her communities of clean water that is why in all their campaign promises/manifesto they (politicians) always include provision of water in this 21st century. What a shame!

I want to say categorically that the absence of a functional public water supply has given room to all manner of water providers which source cannot be guaranteed leading to illnesses that take a toll on human lives.

We cannot afford to be recording statics of annual death of children to water borne diseases like guniea-worm, cholera, hepatitis A, diarrhea, guess fever, shigellosis, malaria and typhoid to mention but a few. 

Enough of untimely deaths due to government negligence!

Even though it’s unfortunate that Nigeria is water logged still yet there’s huge scarcity of clean water. 

I Festus Afofun writes in solidarity with the celebration of the World Water Day to call on all levels of Government to provide adequate clean functional water for human and industrial use in Nigeria. 

Also Nigerians should fight for their rights by demanding for public powered functional water systems in every community across Nigeria. 

It’s our right and we must secure it.

Access to clean water is human right, Government must fulfill their duties!

Festus Afofun is a writer and human right activist can be reached via email: youngcomrade111@gmail.com