By YANGE IKYAA
TheFederal Government of Nigeria has restated its commitment to ending open defecation in Nigeria by the target date of 2025.
The minister of water resources Suleiman Adamu, affirmed the government’s position on Thursday in Abuja during a press conference ahead of the World Toilet Summit to be hosted by Nigeria from November 28 to 19.
Adamu quoted the United Nations Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, as saying during the 2021 World Toilet Day that “life without toilets is dirty, dangerous and undignified.”
He also reiterated that “this World Toilet Conference has become imperative to bring us up to speed as preparations are on for Nigeria’s hosting of the World Toilet Summit on 18th to 19th November, 2022.
“And this is a global event which will provide an excellent opportunity to bring greater visibility to the issue of ending Open Defecation in Nigeria and is expected to enhance Nigeria’s capability to be better equipped towards meeting the target of ending open defecation by 2025”.
The minister disclosed that, presently, 85 local government areas have been certified open defecation-free, and that Jigawa State is the first state in Nigeria to be open defecation-free.
“As of today, we have 85 local government areas certified open defecation-free. It might interest you to note that Jigawa State has blazed the trail as the first state to become ODF,” he said.
Adamu stated further that the Jigawa State government deserved commendation for their dedication to the work of becoming ODF. He also commended the Clean Nigeria Campaign team and UNICEF for their steadfastness to the campaign.
According to him, the 2022 World Toilet Summit would be a gathering of stakeholders, NGOs, development partners and high level decision makers to better strategize and address sanitation challenges and proffer solutions that would help to resolve issues around open defecation.
His words: “It is noteworthy that the Federal Government of Nigeria has demonstrated commitment at the highest political level to the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Sector in Nigeria through various initiatives like the presidential declaration of state of emergency in the WASH sector, the National Action Plan for the revitalization of the WASH Sector 1(2018), Partnership for Expanded Water Sanitation and Hygiene (PEWASH) programme Strategy (2016-2030), Clean Nigeria: Use the Toilet’ Campaign (CNC), and the Sustainable Urban and Rural WASH project (SURWASH), amongst others.”
He further explained that significant huge potentials abound from sanitation when it is delivered as a service, which could encourage the creation of sanitation products, building of toilets, establishment of mega utilities, treatment plants, as well as medium and small entrepreneurs at the community level.
This, according to the minister, would assuage the spread of diseases whilst providing a leverage on private sector professionals and investment capabilities.
Adamu informed that Nigeria is the second African country after South Africa to host the World Toilet Summit since it was instituted in 2013.
The permanent secretary in the ministry of water resources, Didi Walson-Jack, while noting that the World Toilet Organization (WTO) on 22nd February, 2022 announced the selection of Nigeria as the host Country for the 2022 World Toilet Summit, also said that this opportunity was expected to enable participants, exhibitors and other stakeholders in the water and sanitation sector to have a wide range of discussions within the sanitation value chain.
According to her “the conference will spur a robust interaction with journalists for the expansion of the media landscape on sanitation support systems, building and sustenance of political will, multi- stakeholders collaboration, and increase awareness of the entire populace towards building a new culture of safe sanitation. This in turn will promote our collective effort to end open defecation in Nigeria by the year 2025”.
Goodwill messages were also received from the founder of the World Toilet Organization, Mr Jack Sim, who joined the conference virtually from Singapore, as well as from UNICEF representative.
Other stakeholders and development partners, including OPS-WASH, Coca-cola, and Reckitts Benckinser, the producers of Harpic, were physically present at the event.
