Dutch Crown Prince Willem-Alexander was an unlikely speaker at the gathering of leaders, heads of state and government of the African Union in Sharm al-Sheikh, Egypte, on Monday. He spoke to them about sanitation, the need for toilets and frankness about these matters in order to get a better life for more than one billion people. The Prince of Orange is chair of the UN Advisory Board on Water and Sanitation.
‘At last, they are on the right path!’ said my father, the late Prince Claus of the Netherlands. It was July 2002, and he had just heard from his sickbed of the birth of your African Union in Durban. A united Africa was his dream, the renaissance of the continent he loved so much.
My father grew up in Africa, worked for Africa, defended Africa. He loved Africa, believed in Africa, dreamed of Africa. Africa was in my father’s genes. And he passed on those genes and his passion for Africa to his children. He also understood better than anyone that without the ability to manage water, further development remains a pipe dream.
Water and sanitation are the essential ingredients for a life of dignity and for sustainable development and can only be achieved in a stable political environment that respects rule of law and fundamental freedoms. (...) Standing here, I realise that many of you must have known my father. Everyone who knew him personally understood how passionate and enthusiastic he was about Africa, and how committed he was. They will know exactly what I meant when I described him at the start of this speech.
‘Africa is running against time.’ That is what the former Chairperson of the African Union, His Excellency President Kufuor, stressed again last year. And this is most certainly true when it comes to achieving the Millennium Development Goals. (…) of nearly one billion people in Africa, only around 602 million currently use an improved drinking water source, and no more than 360 million use an improved sanitation facility.
Africa is clearly not on track to meet the Millennium Development Goal target for drinking water and sanitation. We must not allow Africa to reach the point where it faces a continuous, endemic water and sanitation crisis that debilitates and kills huge numbers of people, threatens the health of the workforce, stands in the way of economic growth, and limits access to education and therefore life opportunities.
Every year, an estimated one million Africans die from diseases related to poor sanitation and hygiene, and unsafe drinking water. Health, dignity and development are at stake – for Africa as a whole, and for millions of individual Africans. Access to water and sanitation is a prerequisite. If the political will is there, it can be done.
In the distant past you yourselves may have experienced what it is like to have no access to a sustainable source of drinking water and, above all, to adequate sanitation. I myself have never had that misfortune. But as a pilot for AMREF Flying Doctors in East Africa, I saw for myself how crucial this form of preventive health care is.
(..) Yet perhaps you, like many others, will find it difficult to go home and speak passionately about sanitation and related subjects like human faeces. I would urge you to personally help break through the deadly taboo that surrounds this subject. That is why UNSGAB advocated declaring 2008 the International Year of Sanitation. We must overcome our discomfort at talking about toilets and personal hygiene.
We need the words, the courage and the dedicated resources to do what we must to make a difference. In the light of all of this, it will come as no surprise that I was delighted to note that some distinguished African Heads of State and Government took the initiative to have themselves photographed with a toilet. Their courage symbolised the step forward Africa needs to take.
I can only invite you all to follow their lead, and break through the sanitation taboo. Let us call a spade a spade and a toilet a toilet. It worked in many countries for HIV/AIDS, so why shouldn’t it work for sanitation too? © GPD Netherlands Press Association; Source: © RVD. Full text: http://www.koninklijkhuis.nl/content.jsp?objectid=25897
Sunni Arab nations have been wary of Iraq's Shiite-dominated government and its ties with regional power Iran. Arab leaders have avoided visiting and embassies have been closed or staffed with lower level officials because of security concerns. 
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