The Nairobi Water and Sewerage Services Bill 2023 which is being promoted by nominated MCA Joyce Muthoni will soon be tabled in the County Assembly. The Bill contains regressive proposals which have been contested by community organizations, residents and water company unions in the county.
Currently, water provision in Nairobi is under the Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company, an entity run by the County Government of Nairobi. However, only 50% of Nairobi residents have access to piped water from the entity with the rest, especially those in informal settlements forced to rely on vendors, kiosks, so called illegal connections and boreholes.
One of the issues in contention is Article 6(k) of the proposed law which proposes the involvement of private sector actors in water provision, and potentially the privatization of some or all aspects of water provision in Nairobi.
Water privatization is a controversial issue the world over, especially since the United Kingdom became the first country to sell off its entire water sector to private actors in the 1980s. Many cities and municipalities who had sold off or given concessions to private entities are reversing the trend and re-municipalizing water provision.
Around 200 cities, including Buenos Aires, Johannesburg, Paris, Accra, Berlin, La Paz, Maputo and Kuala Lumpur, have reverted to public control of their water sectors in the past decade. According to the Small Planet Institute, in the last five years the failure rate of water and sewerage privatizations has increased to 34%.
Citizens, community organizations and unions under the banner of the Nairobi Water Justice Working Group have been holding community conversations in informal settlements on the proposed Bill. The Working Group held these meeting with communities from Mathare, Ruaraka, Kayole and Mukuru.
Key concerns raised by the communities on the bill was access to water especially if it was to be provided as a commodity for profit, the lack of adequate infrastructure and adequate supply to informal settlements and water quality and safety. Communities also complained that there were water vending cartels allied to politicians who controlled water supply and pricing.
During the consultations, communities expressed reservations about the provisions in the Bill to remove oversight of the new water provision entity from the County Assembly and put the entity under the direct control of the County Executive. The Bill proposes that the directors of the Board be directly appointed by the Governor without any vetting or involvement of the Assembly.
Through the Nairobi Water Justice Working Group, over 500 representatives of communities, water users, unions and social justice movements signed a petition which was presented to the County Assembly on 8th October 2023 demanding a halt to the tabling of the bill to allow for a consultative process.
It is increasingly becoming apparent that universal access to safe water ad adequate sanitation is best achieved by ensuring that water provision and management remains within the public sector and that water is treated as a public good rather than a commodity for profit.
Odhiambo Oyoko is the Advocacy Coordinator for the Nairobi Water Justice Working Group
