07/10/2026
"Ndox mooy diam." (Water is life.) Wolof proverb
920 million people in sub-Saharan Africa lack safely managed sanitation. Women and girls bear the heaviest burden, through health risks, lost education, and daily indignity.
On the 10th of October 2026, the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights and the African Renaissance Trust will convene an expert panel to draft the continent's first Guidelines on the Right to Sanitation in Africa, with a specific focus on women and girls.
Grounded in the African Charter, the Maputo Protocol, the African Disability Protocol and other relevant continental legal frameworks, these Guidelines will set standards for safe, dignified, and accessible sanitation, putting the most marginalised centre.
African Union