FG not paying attention to sanitation sub-sector – WaterAid

WaterAid has said that the government is paying little or no attention to sanitation sub-sector sayig that the sitiation has left about 46 million Nigerians defecating in the open and only 26 percent having access to sanitation facilities.
The Non Governmental Organisation stressed the need to scale up the commercialisation of sanitation facilities across the country to reduce open defecation and its attending consequences.
In order to increase access to sanitation facilities, WaterAid had introduced Sanitation Marketing, a market based approach that views households as discerning consumers rather than beneficiaries of charities.
The former Country Director WaterAid Michael Ojo during the End of the Year Project dissemination of the Sustainable Total Sanitation (STS) held yesterday in Abuja opined that to meet the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) on sanitation by 2030 there was need to collaborate with the private businesses to deliver sanitation services to the people.
He disclosed that the pilot phase of the Sustainable Total Sanitation (STS) in two states of Ekiti and Enugu where in community members were triggered through Community led Total Sanitation (CLTS) to demand for affordable toilet facilities.
Ojo noted that WaterAid is building easy and affordable toilets for rural communities for easy sanitation hence the introduction of sancropants wash toilets in the last five years.
Ojo added that it would also aid sanitation business in urban cities with slums like Abuja to put an end to open defecations across different local government areas in the states insisting that finance and workable environment is key.
He stressed that the government as a major stakeholder should enlighten Nigerians at all levels via the ministry of water resources to construct sanitation facilities in public places across the country as part of its intervention programme in improving sanitation and ending open defecations.