Going to the toilet in Africa can be a personal safety risk, and not just from a health perspective. Women and children, in particular, suffer as a result, says WaterAid Nigeria. “Though statistics are not readily available, there is a high risk of attacks on women and girls who must find a secluded place away from their homes to relieve themselves. Without access to safe and private toilets, women and girls are more vulnerable to attack or rape,” states the organisation’s most recent Overflowing Cities report.

The data shows that 130 million Nigerians, 71 per cent of the country’s population, has to make do without safe, private, functional toilets. Of them, 46 million are forced to practise open defecation.

Nigeria’s situation is not unique. The 2017 Progress on Drinking Water, Sanitation and Hygiene report by the World Health Organisation and the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) shows that 220 million people globally defecated in the open. Of these, a quarter lives in Sub-Saharan Africa. The statistics point to the challenges Africa faces in meeting target 2 of Sustainable Development Goal 6: achieving access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation by 2030.

Axolile Notywala of Local Government Programme at the Social Justice Coalition (SJC), concurs. “People are attacked, robbed, raped and killed when they go to the toilet, particularly at night,” says the head of the human rights movement, which has been fighting for dignified sanitation in Cape Town’s informal settlements for over eight years. “Only a few cases end up in the newspapers. Most go unnoticed.”

One case that caused a media storm, albeit temporarily, was the murder of 19-year old Sinoxolo Mafevuka. Last year March, her raped and lifeless body was found in a communal toilet in Cape Town’s Khayelitsha township.

In 2016, 53-year-old Janet Muhonja from Wasambu, Kenya, died when the latrine she was using collapsed and sank into the ground. In that same year, 12-year-old Blessing from Western Nigeria passed away after falling into a pit latrine. In 2014, six-year old Michael Komape from South Africa’s Limpopo province died a similar death when going to the toilet at school. Human rights group Section27 has since taken the latter case to court. “While provincial and national education departments provided the school with new toilets, to this day there has been no acceptance of responsibility by the government of Michael’s tragic death,” the organisation has said. “ Neither the provincial nor national departments have approached the family to offer any apology or compensation following Michael’s death.

To make things worse, the safety implications of inadequate sanitation contribute to the growing health risk spectrum. “The dam near Marikana stinks terribly,” Mbali says. “Many people who use buckets as toilets in their shacks also empty these in gutters near my house, because there is no other option. It's making people sick.”

Jo Barnes, an epidemiologist who specialises in water pollution and sanitation in low-income households, is not surprised. “A recent water sample I took from a river near an informal settlement in Cape Town contained 34 million Escherichia coli bacteria per 100ml. The maximum allowable contamination for irrigation water is 1000 E. coli bacteria per 100ml of water. This chronic contamination of water resources is impacting human health.”

*Miriam Mannak is a freelance journalist based in South Africa.

This series of news articles is part of the Wastewater Management and Sanitation Provision in Africa Project, a partnership between the African Development Bank (AfDB), UN Environment and GRID-Arendal. The project is supported by the AfDB through its Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Initiative (funded by the Governments of Burkina Faso, Canada, Denmark, France, Italy, Switzerland and the Netherlands), and the Multi-Donor Water Partnership Programme (funded by the Governments of Canada and Denmark). The project is also funded by the Government of Norway and UNEP, and technically supported by GRID-Arendal.