Africa Day: Advocating Sustainable Water Management

“Making water safe is guaranteeing health. Making water systems secured is enhancing the dignity. Securing the two is ensuring the sustainable development.” These are the words of the Minister of External Relations, Mbella Mbella, as he chaired commemorative activities of this year’s edition of the Africa Day at the courtyard of the Ministry of External Relations on May 25, 2026. Organised activities hold under the theme; “Assuring Sustainable Water Availability and Safe Sanitation Systems to Achieve the Goal of Agenda 2063.” In attendance were Heads of African Diplomatic Missions accredited to Yaounde, with their exhibition stands which the Minister visited after the event to savour their different customs and peculiarities. In his preliminary statement, Minister Mbella Mbella said it is a moment to celebrate the unity of the continent as well as its traditional and strategic resources, in this case, water. Ensuring access to portable water and secured sanitation systems, the Minister said, is the goal for governments and partners. Despite challenges faced, he added, Cameroon, through the commemoration, aligns its action with the goals of the African Union. “Our country has elevated water to the status of national heritage through a strengthened legislative framework, notably the laws of 1998, 2009 and 2019 while progressively transferring local water management responsibilities to decentralised territorial authorities,” Minister Mbella Mbella stated. Building on the national integrated water resources management action plan, adopted in 2009, as well as the national water policy adopted in 2024, Cameroon, he added, aims to achieve a sanitation coverage rate of 60 per cent by 2030 in conformity with the national development strategy and sustainable water resource management by 2035. According to him, these policy orientations reflect Cameroon’s determination to make water and sanitation no...