EDITORIAL: Prioritise the water sector

>The government is seeking private sector support to expand investments in the water sector in line with implementation of the second phase of the Water Sector Development Programme (WSDPII).

World Water Day marked on Saturday was a poignant reminder that fresh water is increasingly becoming scarce around the globe, setting the stage for a doomsday scenario in the next few decades. Access to water is at the centre of conflicts in some parts of Africa, and this serves to underscore the magnitude of the problem and its potential to slowly but steadily spiral out of control.

>Less than half of Dar es Salaam residents enjoy constant supply of piped water, and their pain of having to hustle for this key commodity is furthered by the knowledge that close to 60 per cent of the precious liquid that leaves the sources is wasted en route to the consumers.

East African Community Secretariat, Arusha, Tanzania, 24 June 2014;The Federal Republic of Germany today signed an intergovernmental agreement with the East African Community (EAC) in order to support higher education and training for future journalists and media professionals.

Germany makes available a financial contribution of 14 million Euros in support of the Graduate School of Media and Communications (GSMC) of the Aga Khan University, a recently established Centre of Excellence for ...

>The arrest of 12 water thieves on Sunday in an operation led by the Deputy Minister for Water, Mr Amos Makalla, is most welcome, for it might awaken others of their ilk that we still have a working government, a thing that some might have been querying given the impunity which a few among us display at the expense of fellow Tanzanians

Reports that only 30 per cent of water treated and pumped by Kilimanjaro Water Supply Company Limited (Kiliwater) actually reaches consumers with the rest going to waste are representative of a problem that is prevalent in almost all urban areas.

>Water is life, the saying goes. Yet many Tanzanians die not for lack of the precious liquid but for drinking it when it is  contaminated and unsafe for human consumption. That is why we consider most valid the concern expressed by the medical officer in-charge at Mwanshimba Dispensary in Tabora, Dr George Kavella, who noted that the health of 17,000 people in the ward is at risk because they drink dirty water from a dam.

>President Jakaya Kikwete has asked the Treasury to prioritise the ongoing voters’ registration so that it gets completed in time.