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Speech by The Prime Minister of Zimbabwe, The Right Honourable Dr. Morgan Richard Tsvangirai, at the launch of the Rural WASH project, Tsholotsho, 27 June 2012
Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai
June 27, 2012

Deputy Prime Ministers Hon. Thokozani Khupe and Professor Mutambara,
The Governor of Matabelland North Mrs Mathuthu
The Minister of Water Resources Management, Hon. Sam Sipepa Nkomo,
The Permanent secretary in the Ministry of Water, Mr R. Chitsiko
Cabinet Ministers here present
Unicef Country Director, Dr Peter Salama
DFID Head of Mission Mr Dave Fish
Invited Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen

It gives me great honour and pleasure to interact with you on this occasion that is set to change the face of our rural areas.

I am particularly proud that the rural Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Programme, which we are launching today, is being commissioned in the region of Kings.

Although the project will cover five provinces, its launch in this region is befitting because this area has gone through difficulties associated with insufficient water supply.

Water is one of nature's most important gifts to mankind and it is a key component in determining the quality of our lives.

Essential to life, water is one of the most indispensable elements to good health, necessary for the digestion, helps maintain proper muscle tone; supplies oxygen and nutrients to the cells; rids the body of wastes; and serves as a natural air conditioning system.

Just to emphasize the importance of water to the mechanics of the human body:

Water makes up more than two thirds of human body weight, and without water, we would die in a few days. The human brain is made up of 95 percent water. A mere two percent drop in our body's water supply can trigger signs of dehydration: fuzzy short-term memory. Mild dehydration is also one of the most common causes of daytime fatigue.

Water serves as a lubricant and forms the fluids that surround the joints.

Water forms the base for saliva.

Water regulates the body temperature, as the cooling and heating is distributed through perspiration.

The Rural WASH Project we are launching here today seeks to help ensure that our bodies remain functional and productive-in short it is a project that aims at preserving human life.

The important project we launch here today is designed to contribute to the Millennium Development Goal for water and sanitation. The Millennium Development Goals' aim is to halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe water and basic sanitation.

The Rural WASH projecting aims at ensuring access to safe water supply and to ensuring that sanitation improves by 50 per cent in rural areas in five provinces through contributing to WASH sector recovery as well as modeling of best practices for national replication and informing national policy, strategies and guidelines development.

It involves rehabilitation of 7,400 broken down boreholes, drilling of 1,500 boreholes in 10,000 communities and construction of 15,000 latrines in 1,500 rural schools (including gender appropriate latrines for boys and girls as well as suitable latrines for people with disabilities that are also gender appropriate).

Failure to provide safe drinking water is a serious abdication of duty by Government.

For almost 30 years after our independence our country has paid lip service to many water projects throughout the country such as the National Matabeleland Zambezi Water project and the Kunzwi Dam project among many others. Rural water projects will transform communities and create green zones. We must take a leaf from countries like Israel which has turned a desert into a greenbelt. Our vision is that its province should be able to feed itself if we are to attain our goal of a $100 billion economy in 30 years. We will be able not only to create jobs and feed ourselves but to feed others as well.

The development of Tsholotsho, Gokwe, Mataga, Silobela or any other area in Zimbabwe will set the base for the establishment of thriving industry in these remote areas, which will have economic benefits countrywide. Irrigation schemes, small-scale farming and many other industrial sectors can take advantage of developed rural areas.

Without a rural development strategy, we will not be able to attain national development because about 60 percent of the population lives in the rural areas.

Last Saturday, I had the privilege to commission the Silobela boreholes programme that is aimed at providing safe water for personal and household use.

The Silobela project, spearheaded by area MP, Anadi Silulu, has so far installed nine boreholes, three of them situated in school premises. Using proceeds from the Constituency Development Fund (CDF), the project has changed the lives of the people through the provision of the most critical product vital for human survival-water!

The installation of boreholes in the drought prone area has reduced the distances women used to travel to fetch water. The average distance that women in Africa walk to collect water is six kilometers.

In rural Sub-Saharan Africa millions of people share their domestic water sources with animals or rely on unprotected wells that are breeding grounds for diseases.

This is unacceptable after 50 years of independence in Africa.

Government must ensure and guarantee the provision of safe drinking water to its citizens through annual budget allocations for the installation and development of water infrastructure.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Government's commitment towards the provision of safe drinking water is critical for the health of our people. In this vein, Government has established a fully-fledged Ministry of Water to ensure maximum focus and concentration on issues around water and sanitation.

Government is seized with the Mtshabezi water project whose development has reached advanced stages. It is saddening to note that such an important project has been delayed by burdensome procurement procedures.

The Government is also working with development partners in other parts of the country to ensure that we develop infrastructure for water delivery. During my visit to China last month, the Minister of Water and I held high-level discussions with several potential investors involved in the water sector and we expect movement on several water projects such as the Matabeleland Zambezi Water Project which we expect to result in a green belt in this province. I want to say that this project is a national project and is being given national priority.

Our vision is to harness the country's water potential in dry regions such as Matabeleland and the Midlands province, not only for food self-sufficiency, but to provide citizens with clean water.

We urge co-operating partners and donors to continue to assist Government in developing water infrastructure countrywide.

Government has played a part but this is not enough. We will look at water sector reform including the policy, institutional and legal framework to reflect the changed circumstances in Zimbabwe.

The deterioration in the physical infrastructure has been accompanied by lack of progress in building institutional capacities for management and regulation of the basic services associated with these networks. Problems in this area stem from a disjointed approach to regulation and oversight among the ministries responsible for these sectors, compounded by a substantial loss of skills in the public workforce.

The policy review should speak to these challenges and intertwine operations in various Government ministries.

We have noted that institutional and regulatory inadequacies have in the past resulted in minimal amounts of investment by the private sector in basic infrastructure.

Government will review the policy documents with a view to clean them up to relate to the broader Government policies on investment where reliable water supply is a key factor.

This year's World Water Day, an international day marked annually as a means of focusing attention on the importance of freshwater and advocating for the sustainable management of freshwater resources, highlighted the relationship between the provision of water and food production.

As Government, we are aware that the country is facing a serious drought and we have put in place mechanisms to ensure that no one starves. There are areas where there have been reports of partisan distribution of food and that should stop. Everyone should access poor regardless of political affiliation.

The UN noted that over the coming decades, feeding a growing global population and ensuring food and nutrition security for all will depend on increasing food production. This, in turn, means ensuring the sustainable use of our most critical finite resource - water.

Poor hygiene, sanitation and water exacerbate poverty by reducing productivity and elevating health-care costs. Safe water sources near homes reduce the time-wasting toil of fetching water and provide opportunities for poor families to engage in small-scale productive activities.

This shows that we must do more.

Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to express my gratitude to the partners involved in the Rural WASH Project, the funders, DFID, Unicef and all those connected to the this sterling work.

Most of these partners have been on the forefront in improving water and sanitation in Zimbabwe, helping us in the fight against cholera and typhoid and have been helpful in many other sectors such as education and health.

As a Government, we expect to see the expedient roll-out of the programme we have launched today so that it results in real change in the lives of the people in our rural communities.

Ladies and Gentlemen, it is my singular honour to declare the Rural WASH Project officially launched.

I thank you.

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