"Development cannot be attained in the absence ofrespect for all human rights." (Agenda for Development, UN General Assembly, June 1997)

Human rights is the basic human dignity of every human being in the world. The right to live, right to food, right to clean water, right to adequate housing, right to fresh air, right to education, right to clean environment, right to standard health care, right to equality and so on are every person's natural-born right that must be guaranteed and protected by all the states in the world. It has to be ensured that any form of development executed in any locale must not violate human rights and undermine the dignity of any person.

In line with this concept, the Rio Earth Summit in 1992 moved towards the application of a human rights approach in attaining sustainable development in the world. This is because unsustainable development is depriving certain groups in society and will deprive more people in the future of their rights.

Human development cannot take a backseat to make way for material development and past experiences have proven that such development only benefits the elite minority while the majority suffers. Therefore, human rights is a vital component in any development process.

Agenda 21, which is the blueprint for sustainable development, has outlined that sustainable development is only possible when human development and human rights are given equal priority and importance. It was adopted by more than 100 heads of state who attended the Rio Summit in 1992. The commitment was to achieve sustainable development through human rights approach.

A decade has passed since the Rio Summit. The Johannesburg's World Summit on Sustainable Development 2002, which marks the 10th anniversary of the Rio Earth Summit, is going on.

The progress of sustainable development over the past ten years does not appear to be very encouraging. It seems to be business as usual in many countries.

Human rights statistics

Malaysia took more than seven years after the Rio Summit to seriously translate the Agenda 21 into the practical Local Agenda 21 tested in four pilot sites. Even worse, powerful nations such as the US is attempting to water down the language of future action plans.

Hence, many would question whether we are still moving towards sustainable development based on human rights? Or have we turned sustainable development to merely trading human rights and environment on the WSSD (World Summit on Sustainable Development) negotiation table?

What are the achievements of the implementation of Agenda 21 in protecting human rights?

Let's take a look at these statistics to see whether the human rights situation of the majority of the world has improved.

In 1997-1999, an estimated 815 million people were undernourished. Everyday more than 30,000 children around the world die of preventable diseases that is 11 million children every year. Nearly 14,000 people are infected with HIV/AIDS. Furthermore, out of 680 million children of primary school age, 113 million are not in school .97 percent of them in developing countries.

The number is higher for children of secondary school age.

Forced eviction is still taking place in many places around the world in the name of development and war. A significant number of people in the world, especially the poor and those living in rural areas, are deprived of permanent housing, water, sanitation facilities and electricity. (Human Development Report 2002)

Even in Malaysia, people are still directly or indirectly deprived of their rights to a decent life. Forced eviction is a common occurrence in Malaysia especially in the plantation sector and also in urban settlements due to development projects such as building of new townships, golf clubs, condominiums and luxury houses.

More homeless people

Until May 2002, 9,542 families in Selangor were forcefully evicted from their homes. People who have been forcefully evicted most of the time are not provided with alternative houses causing them further hardship. In addition to that, the government has failed to make available or build enough units of low-cost houses with affordable prices for the poor.

With such a situation, we can expect more people to be homeless particularly in Kuala Lumpur and Selangor by the year 2005, as the state government is pushing hard to ensure that both these places are 'squatter free' by the year 2005.

Another issue that infringes the rights of the people in Malaysia is the privatisation of basic amenities such as water, electricity, road, sanitation services and soon it will be the health and education services. Privatisation of basic amenities has caused the cost of living of the Malaysian people to increase and in some areas especially in the rural areas, water and electricity are unaffordable hence becoming luxury items.

Middle-class workers and low-paid workers are suffering to make ends meet, as livelihood has become a burden with the rising cost of living. Basic amenities which is supposed be the responsibility of the government have been commercialised to private companies to make huge profits.

Further on, the right to social security, right to work and fair pay for work, right to equal consideration before the law, right to social order assuring human rights and so on are also violated.

Laws such as the Internal Security Act (ISA), Trade Unions Act, Industrial Relations Act, Police Act, Emergency Ordinance and so on deprive the people of their human rights. A fear culture is created among the people in order to ensure they do not demand for their rights and can be easily suppressed so that the government of the day can remain in power and corporations can make huge profits.

Environment degradation

Environment is another area that has been neglected in Malaysia. Air pollution and water pollution is widespread due to industrial activities. Furthermore forest areas and large plantations are cleared for development projects. At times even forest reserve areas are also taken over for development projects causing ecological imbalance.

When the environment is not protected, people are deprived of clean air, clean water source and the right to live in a clean environment. Not only the future generation will be deprived of a good environment, the present generation can immediately suffer from the effects of environment degradation.

Okay, so the situation is bad around us with people going without houses, clean environment, enough food and so on. Many will argue that this is a small price to pay for the development of the country after all the future generation will benefit from the development.

One question, who gives a person the right to make another person less dignified than him or her? "Might is right" is definitely not the answer. This is a matter of principle not convenience.

Well, the question is how? Well, human rights approaches to sustainable development have both a national and international dimension.

In the national situation, governments are obligated to respect, protect, fulfill and promote the rights of the people under their own jurisdiction. The government should come up with laws and strict enforcement to protect the rights of the people. Development projects that violate human rights and are not environment friendly should not be approved.

Furthermore, the people's opinions on any development project should be obtained, respected and considered before proceeding with the project. Public participation is important in the decision making process to make sure that sustainable development actually takes place.

Affordable and accessible

Other than that, the government should also be proactive to ensure the rights of the people are guaranteed. For instance, the government should ensure that the prices of food, basic utilities and houses are affordable and accessible to the people.

Basic education and healthcare and other needs should be provided by the government to build up the capacity of the needy in order to elevate themselves from their substandard conditions. Government agencies that directly deal with the public should not be privatised. Enough low-cost houses should be built to accommodate the demand of the working class. These kind of proactive steps can be done through public policies and laws.

The international dimension of sustainable development with a human rights approach is that the governments should cooperate internationally and afford international assistance where needed in the realisation of the human rights of the people. There is a need of an international mechanism to hold state and non-state human rights violators accountable for their wrongdoings.

Even though the current situation might seems depressing, but applying human rights approach to sustainable development is still not impossible. South Africa has scored a few good examples such as 'the poor hearings' that promote people's participation and increase public accessibility to generic HIV/AIDS anti-retroviral drugs.

What is needed to achieve this is the political will of the governments of the day to take on the human rights approach for development. People's rights should be prioritised and corporations should be regulated. If this can be done than the road to sustainable development will be a reality for the present and future generations.

KOHILA is an economist, now working on the People Before Profits project in Suaram. She is actively involved in the Community Development Centre, an NGO that fights for the rights of squatters and estate workers.