Al-Hassan Adam

Photo: WaterAid/ Eliza Powell

In 2010, we celebrated the declaration of access to water and sanitation as a human right at the United Nations General Assembly.

Photo: Thomas Henriksson/SIWI

In August 2018, End Water Poverty along with its partners attended World Water Week in Stockholm. End Water Poverty attended this global event to present the recently launched report on National Accountability Mechanisms for SDG 6. The report, its results and importance were discussed during a sofa session interview. To get a sense of how this global event went, we spoke to our International Coordinator, Al-hassan Adam.

This time last year, End Water Poverty brought the misreporting on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) progress levels using incorrect datasets to the attention of the UN Secretary General. The progress report that was flagged by the coalition had used indicators from the Millennium Development Goals instead of the SDGs, thereby not tracking progress accurately.

In November 2017, I was invited to a meeting organised by KEWASNET, a coalition which is a member of End Water Poverty, to discuss Kenya’s WASH CSO advocacy strategy based on the 2016 Kenya Water Act.

Kenyan CSOs were excited about this news; at the same time they were cautious about some aspects of it. This is the situation with most laws written through consultative processes when many interest groups lobby for their constituents.

A few months ago, when the Joint Monitoring Programme released their first report to measure progress on elements of goal 6, it brought about some mixed feelings amongst some NGOs.

In my ten years of campaigning and advocating for water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), we have never had such a unique political opportunity for change as we have had this year at the start of Agenda 2030; the start of the new development goals for the next 15 years. In the past few months, my colleagues and I at the End Water Poverty secretariat have been criss-crossing Africa, Europe, South Asia and Latin America to tap into the enthusiasm of our members at the beginning of this ambitious path to achieve a universally better future for all.

Recently I was lucky to be a participant, along with a group of nearly 100 civil society representatives, who gathered for the African Civil Society Forum, ahead of the  6th African Water Week in Tanzania.

Blog post written by the International Coordinator of End Water Poverty, Al-hassan Adam in February 2016. 

Blog post written by End Water Poverty International Coordinator, Al-Hassan Adam.