The 79th session of the Scientific and Technical Council of AfWA which opened on 16 July in Kampala, Uganda, closed on 18 July. On this occasion, the National Water and Sewerage Corporation invited the participants to a gala dinner in the Kampala SERENA hotel gardens.

In her speech to guests, Dr. Rose KAGWA, vice president of AfWA and President of the STC Organizing Committee, expressed her gratitude to all participants for their presence in Uganda. She also thanked the 27 partners who associated their image with the event. "This is the 6th time Uganda has had the privilege of hosting this important meeting. The Organizing Committee and I were pleased to welcome you once again, despite the very short time we had for the preparations. Despite everything, we have demonstrated our ability to organize meetings successfully", she said. Following Dr KAGGWA, Mr. Silver MUGISHA, Director General of the National Water and Sewerage Corporation, the host of the STC, congratulated the participants for the three days of intensive work during which all aspects regarding access to water and sanitation were addressed. He expressed the hope that lessons learned, experiences received and/or shared will make a difference in the respective countries. He ended his speech by appealing to the Executive Board to validate Uganda's candidacy for the organization of the next AfWA Congress scheduled for 2020 because, he added, "we have the experience and capabilities and our country has the best amenities to host an event of this magnitude”.

Taking the floor, the President of AfWA, Mr. Abderrahim EL HAFIDI expressed his joy to be in Uganda, "the pearl of Africa", his first time visit to that country. He congratulated the local committee for the perfect organization of activities and reiterated the promise he made during his election, to be present at all AfWA meetings to "advance this prestigious association.” We need to place it at the rank it deserves. African citizens are waiting for us, they are waiting for our actions to make the water molecule available at any point in Africa. Africans deserve a much higher standard of living than they have today, they deserve to have water, energy, they deserve to live properly, like all the citizens of the world ", he stressed.

We recall that the theme of this STC was "harnessing information and communication technologies (ICT) to accelerate sustainable access to water and sanitation for all in Africa". 120 delegates from 22 countries in Africa and Europe took part in the meetings. It is one of the STCs that has had the largest number of participants, said Sylvain Usher, Executive Director of AfWA. According to some participants, this large number was due to the relevance and timeliness of the theme. "The lessons learned will enable us to improve the quality of services offered to our customerss people and to build our staff capacity", they said.