Water true-cost to manage social contestability? Users’ perceptions about community-managed water standpipes networks in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo

In suburban areas of African megalopolis, the development and commissioning of water produc-
tion and distribution infrastructures fail to keep pace with unplanned urbanisation. Therefore,
millions of households do not have access to safe tap water. In Democratic Republic of Congo, asso-
ciations of users of drinking water standpipes networks (ASUREP) have emerged in the peripheral
districts of major cities. They share the same operating principles of governance and participatory
management organized in a reference model (the ASUREP model). It was designed as an alterna-
tive to governmental model to respond proactively to the criticisms that frequently target tap water
producers and distributors, therefore reducing their exposition to social contestation. A rigorous
evaluation of the impacts generated by the application of the ASUREP model is therefore partic-
ularly useful, for the Congolese society but also to shed light on other innovative alternatives. In
the framework of this evaluation, we conducted in 2020 a survey of more than 1,000 households
in the peri-urban areas of Kinshasa. In this paper we remind the key operating principles that
should be applied by the managers of the ASUREP serving these households. We synthesize our
observations about the difference between the reference model and its application when it comes
to water pricing. We stress that most of the households served by the ASUREP do not master
the water true-cost concept and that most of the respondents have a limited understanding of
the determinants of the unit price of water. There is a form of contestant vigilance expressed by
many households because the price of water is depicted as not transparent and is therefore likely
considered as too high. In the peri-urban areas of Kinshasa, most users put up with this situation
rather than lapsing into active protests and many of them do not use the communication chan-
nels provided for participatory governance. We discuss these results and conclude this evaluation
step by identifying two avenues for future research related to the role of informal institutions
in the management of social contestability and of full transparency on water production costs.