A/HRC/42/47/Add.2 Special Rapporteur recommends that the Government of Malaysia should incorporate human rights into its continued efforts to improve water and sanitation services for all. 73. The situation as regards access to drinking water and sanitation for all, with an emphasis on leaving no one behind, would be quite different if water and sanitation were legally recognized as human rights and if Malaysia explicitly recognized the obligation to realize those rights. Building on the current efforts to ratify the relevant international human rights treaties, the Special Rapporteur strongly encourages the Government to consider his observations and recommendations in the present report and to take urgent action to address the situation of access to water and sanitation by the groups that have been left behind. 74. In this connection, the Special Rapporteur recommendations to the Government of Malaysia. 75. offers the following Concerning the legislative framework, the Government should: (a) Ratify those international human rights treaties that it has not yet ratified, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the International Labour Organization Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989 (No. 169), the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and the Protocol thereto, the Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons and the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness; (b) Harmonize the legal standards on water and sanitation services and ensure their coherence across the entire country so that they are in accordance with the human rights to water and sanitation. 76. Concerning the institutional framework, the Government should: (a) Assess whether the absence of federal bodies, established as part of the water and sanitation reform, in Kelantan, Sabah and Sarawak have affected the quality of water and sanitation services and make every effort to remove the inequalities that have resulted from this situation; (b) Provide technical and financial support for the expansion and improvement of water and sanitation services in Kelantan, Sabah and Sarawak until they offer the same level of access to those services as the states in Peninsular Malaysia; (c) Harmonize regulation of water and sanitation services in the country, through bodies that are independent of the service providers; (d) Introduce measures to ensure the independence and autonomy of the National Water Services Commission and that the main objectives of regulation are aligned with the human rights to water and sanitation and the principles of human rights. 77. Concerning the policy framework, the Government should: (a) Implement a plan of action to realize the human rights to water and sanitation, including the normative content of those rights and the principles of human rights; (b) Ensure that all policies prioritize the elimination of inequalities in access to water and sanitation services; (c) Introduce mechanisms to collect relevant disaggregated data on access to water and sanitation service by relevant groups, particularly those based on race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth, wealth or other status. 78. Concerning water quality, the Government should: (a) Ensure that the Ministry of Health has a more active role in auditing and interpreting the results of the monitoring of water quality by providers; 17

Select target paragraph3

Connect to a paragraph
Connect to an entity
Disable highlights
Add to table of contents