Pretoria - Hygiene and habitable settlements will form part of North West MEC for Human Settlements, Desbo Mohon's focus as the province embarks on a massive campaign aimed at raising awareness on sanitation.
Themed "Sanitation for health and dignity", Mohono will use the campaign to mobilise communities and municipalities to prioritise sanitation and highlight government's efforts to ensure that people have access to sanitation.
There will also be campaigns across the four provincial districts with the main event taking place on Friday at Ditsobotla Stadium in Modiri Molema District Municipality where sanitation still remains a challenge as a result of the continuing mushrooming of informal settlements.
"The campaign will be targeting school children in the province as they are regarded as the most vulnerable because of the unhygienic environment most schools find themselves in," Mohono said.
Sanitation backlogs are an international problem affecting all countries, with more than 2.4 billion people in the world without access to sanitation.
The World Health Organisation estimates that 1.8 million people die each year due to diarrheal diseases.
South Africa has committed itself to eradicating sanitation backlogs by 2015
