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Workshop to explore corruption in the water sector
Accra, Sept. 27, Ghanadot/GNA - A two-day
workshop to explore the issue of fighting corruption in
water production, distribution and use in the West African
sub-region opened in Accra on Wednesday with a call on
citizens to help identify and eliminate the corrupt
practices.
Dr John Butterworth, Project Officer of International Water
and Sanitation Centre (IRC), The Netherlands, said the fact
that corruption in the water and sanitation industry within
the West African sub-region had not yet become a topical
issue did not mean that corruption did not exist.
Corruption, he noted, deprived about 1.25 billion people of
access to drinking water, according to the United Nations
World Water Development report 2006.
Dr Butterworth said indications from other developing
countries especially in Asia had also shown that a large
percentage of water sector finance was drained by
corruption.
Corruption hinders effective supply to the poor, who ended
up paying more for water, which could even the contaminated,
he told the about 50 participants from Ghana, Benin,
Nigeria, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
"Beyond direct human suffering, corruption intensifies the
world's regional water scarcities. It promotes the excessive
withdrawal from surface and underground water sources,
pollutes fresh water resources, encourages inefficient
freshwater use and undermines environmental sustainability,"
Dr Butterworth said.
The workshop on the theme "Transparency and Accountability
in Delivery of Water and Sanitation Services" is being
organised by Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII), and Training,
Research and Networking for Development (TREND) with support
from Water Integrity Network, all NGOs.
It aims at providing participants with the opportunity to
identify the nature and ramification of corruption in the
water sector in the sub-region, which has a large segment of
its people not having access to potable water and sanitation
facilities.
The workshop would also look at the strategic actions that
could be pursued to address corruption if it did exist in
the region.
Professor Ken Agyeman Attafuah, Executive Director, Justice
and Humans Institute, an NGO, said corruption in Ghana as
elsewhere in the West African sub-region was endemic and
permeated all sectors of the economy and state institutions.
"Bribing for public service is quite common in the business
sector and illegal commissions are reportedly a way of
life," he said and ruled out the fact that corruption could
be absent in the water delivery sector.
Prof. Attafuah said the problem of corruption in the
sub-region was compounded by lack of public confidence in
the effectiveness of the national police institutions, which
were the foremost anti-corruption agency in these countries.
He said the right to safe water imposed an obligation on the
state to provide an enabling environment for access to water
and to provide a non-negotiable minimum amount of safe,
potable water for everyone regardless of economic or social
status.
"The right to water is critically linked to the right to
life, which also embraces the right to food and the right to
a safe, clean and healthy environment."
Nana Kwasi Agyepong, Business Development Manager, GII said
the organisation's vision was to make Ghana a
corruption-free country in all spheres of human endeavours,
where people and institutions would act with integrity,
accountability and transparency.
"Our mission is to continuously create awareness about the
negative effect of corruption and to empower citizens to
demand responsiveness, accountability and transparency from
people and institutions in Ghana," he said.
GNA
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