Civil Society organisations want the government to respect what they promised to remove taxes on sanitary pads to give support on issues regarding menstrual hygiene among women.
Speaking to Journalists as Uganda honours National Sanitary Week and the Uganda Water and Environment Week, the civil society organization under the Ugandan Water and Sanitation Network (UWASNET) urged the government to make sure that they give sanitary pads at zero cost, the pads are also heavily taxed something that makes hard for the girls and women mostly in rural areas find it hard to get them.
Leonard Opeto, the technical program officer at World Vision Uganda said, “Pads should be for free, but surprisingly, taxes are being increased on these items. This is very unfortunate because menstruation is not a choice, All females have to painfully go through it every month. What we are asking the government is to take away the taxes on sanitary pads to make them affordable.”
He also added that both women and girls suffer a lot from bad toilets, but nobody asks them about how to plan things in their communities. He mentioned a study from 2023 that said only 30% of women were asked about how to spend money on toilets in their homes.
Some organizations said that not having enough clean water and good toilets in homes, schools, hospitals, and other public places makes it hard to get rid of extreme poverty and help the country grow. They said things need to change.
They also mentioned that Uganda is doing better than some other places when it comes to having clean water. But to make things better for everyone, they need help from other countries.
“The government is spending money to make sure everyone in Uganda has clean water, good toilets, and can keep clean by 2030, according to Sustainable Development Goal 6. But we’re still not reaching this goal. About 14 million Ugandans still go to the bathroom outside in some places. And in schools and health centres, there are big problems with water and toilets. More than 1640 health centres either don’t have enough water or have none at all,” Opeto explained.
He said that some areas like Terego, Pakwach, Zombo, Dokolo, Buliso, Koboko, and Ntoroko are doing especially badly. Groups outside the government said that the government needs to spend more money on water, toilets, and keeping clean to keep up the progress we’ve made and stop more people from getting sick from diarrhoea.
They said Uganda needs $1.7 billion every year to do all the things needed for water and the environment. Aisha Nankanja, who leads a group working on water and climate, said it’s important for the government to change how it spends money on water.
They should fix old water systems and make new ones, like using solar power to pump water from good underground wells. They also need to spend more money on toilets in schools, health centres, and public places.
James Cleto Mumbere, who works to talk to the government about water issues, said it’s important for local communities to help fix the problem. He said it starts with changing how people act.
“Most of the water we drink at home has poop in it. Even if the water source is clean, we can make it dirty when we use dirty cups or glasses. We need to change how we act,” Mumbere said.
“We need to clean up where we live. We all have the right to live in a place that’s clean and safe so we don’t get sick.”
