By the sideways of Ojo Road, a busy stretch in Ajegunle, a suburb of Lagos, Patience Paul prepares a big bowl of turkey wings for her restaurant’s business.
As she uncovers a gallon of water picked from a row supplied by vendors, an unpleasant image pops up. The interior of the container is covered in a thick, dark-green crust of algae. But the middle-aged cook is not bothered.
Just as it is for dwellers of under-served areas of Lagos, where water vendors fill the shoes of a government missing in action, getting unimproved water in hardly cleaned containers is not unusual.
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Despite huge water resources potential estimated at 267 billion cubic meters of surface water and 92 billion cubic meters of ground water, most Nigerian homes and points of need still lack access to safe and clean water.
About 56 million or 28 percent of Nigeria’s population consume unimproved water, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
Water vending has grown to be an essential player in the water supply chain of many households in the absence of a well-structured water system.
Nigeria’s household water supply
While businesses can easily pass on the cost to their customers, many households have to soak in a fee ranging between N500 and N1,000 per wheel, at least thrice in a week.
With a rife shortage, water cost takes a core stake in household expenditure, both in cost of buying from vendors and an estimated 40 billion hours of productivity spent on fetching from a distance.
This places Nigeria among sub-Saharan African countries that lose about $28.4 billion or 5 percent of their gross domestic product annually.
The toll on health hurts as people easily get exposed to diseases such as diarrhoea, cholera, hepatitis, typhoid, poliomyelitis and shigellosis when they consume contaminated water.
About 90.8 percent of household members are exposed to water contaminated by Escherichia coli, a bacterium that has variants that produce toxins that can lead to diarrhoea, abdominal pain, fever or vomiting.
Diarrhoea, for instance, had a prevalence rate of 18.8 percent in 2014, accounting for over 16 percent of deaths estimated at 150,000 yearly, according to an Africa Centre for Disease Control report.
As of 2019, 75 percent of household members who suffered diarrhoea in Nigeria were children under five as hospital records indicate 13 percent of all cases were diarrhoea.
Globally, 1.7 billion cases of diarrhoea are reported among children younger than five, while an estimated 446,000 children in the same category die annually in most developing countries, the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention fact-sheet on diarrhoea shows.
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Managing any of these diseases under the current state of Nigeria’s poor insurance coverage, inadequate health infrastructures pressured by a demanding population amounts to an out-of-pocket health expenditure overblown by rising cost of diagnosis and treatment.
Neglected Right
The United Nations in 2010 recognised safe drinking water and sanitation as a human right and a basic necessity for good health. Nigeria was a party to that conclusion.
The global body in tracking the progress of its sustainable development goals (SDGs) uses the quality of drinking water as an indicator.
Its sixth SDG goal targets, ‘safely managed drinking water services’ which is defined as an improved drinking water source that is accessible on-premises, available when needed and free from contamination.
Nigeria would seem to have improved with statistics showing that 68 percent of household members have access to improved sources of drinking water.
But the challenge remains that this extent of coverage is anchored on private sourcing.
Just 3.7 percent have their water sources located on premises free of contamination and available when needed, leaving a direct impact on sanitation and hygiene.
Only 12.4 percent of households have a specific place for hand washing where water and soap or other cleansing agents are provided.
The primary responsibility for the provision of public and domestic water supply rests on the state and local governments.
The Federal Ministry of Water Resources (FMWR) is saddled with the responsibility of coordinating water, sanitation, and hygiene efforts in Nigeria, with the National Task Group on Sanitation (NTGS) providing support.
What operates in Nigeria’s current water situation, however, is a shift of these responsibilities to households, while the government still performs poorly in its supporting role – monitoring and evaluation.
Mary Ariaria, a single mother of three, for example, walks close to 500 metres distance to fetch water for her grain-blending business. She has many worries from soaring estate rent to long power cuts and rising school fees, which her business stands as the most viable option of solving.
But the dearth of water threatens the oxygen that keeps her business alive. It’s probably the most practical way her government can demonstrate commitment to the ease of doing business to even enterprises at the lowest cadre.
Yet, the government has failed to take that chance.
Supply from the channels of Lagos State Water Corporation at Babandi Street, Ajegunle, only just resumed in June after months of interruption. But its content is almost unusable until the coloured earth particles in it settle. Drink-ability is automatically out of use options.
Much of the conversations around water, sanitation and hygiene in the country could have improved considerably if the government followed through on the goals outlined in the Nigeria Water Sector Roadmap of 2011.
The blueprint had short term goals of construction such as construction of motorised solar-powered boreholes, supply, and installation of package water treatment plants and completion of abandoned urban and semi-urban water supply projects among others.
In the medium term, it aimed to boost the national water supply access by 17 percent; increase the national sanitation access by 33 percent; and shore up available reservoir capacity.
But they still haven’t translated to clean water access for the majority of Nigerians, a decade after they were articulated.
In 2016, a report released by Environmental Rights Agency Nigeria on the alternative roadmap for the water sector highlighted aging and insufficient water infrastructure; decades of policy somersault; inadequate budget allocation; and regulatory failures as some as root of the water crisis in Lagos, for instance.
The two major water treatment plants in Lagos – Iju and Adiyan – produce about 70 percent of water in the state but neither of them function at optimal capacity.
Less than 10 percent of households have connections while about 30 percent have access to community standpipes which are often dry taps.
While inadequate power supply threatens production, the available water lines are also inadequate to serve the population.
Rasaq Ademola, spokesman, Lagos Water Corporation when contacted said the corporation produces 210 million gallons daily based on its current capacity.
Although he admitted that the actual production is 61.1 percent short of the current demand of 540 million gallons per day.
However, efforts are in motion to raise capacity at the Adiyan II Water plant to 70 million gallons daily, to serve over three million residents in communities including, Ikotun, Idimu, Isolo, Agege I and II, Ajegunle, Lagos west, and Amuwo Odofin, among others.
“The current administration is investing heavily in the water sector to make potable water go round. Plans are on the way to rehabilitate some ageing water infrastructures,” Rasaq said.
“Can’t say how much investment precisely but the Corporation is making renewed efforts to solve the problems of water shortage and also ensure steady supply for the growing population of the state.”
Questions sent to the Federal Ministry of Water Resources didn’t yield any response after a week.
Indications from countries getting it right with the water system show that governments play a central role in aiding access. They explore viable funding mechanisms, budgetary allocation, accountability, affordability, rate structure and partnerships.
For example, in Durban, South Africa, a city fraught with water challenge, Durban’s Water and Sanitation Department provides free basic water of 9,000 litres per household monthly.
In 2015, 93 percent of the population had access to an improved water source in that year.
In Porto Alegre, Brazil, access to water supply rose from 95 percent in 1990 to 99.5 percent in 2001, despite increases in population.
Water supply in Brazil covers an estimated 83 percent of the entire population, with 26 state-owned operators responsible for servicing 70 percent of the Brazilian population (120 million people), a Switzerland Global Enterprise research shows.
For every $1 invested in sanitation, an estimated return of $5 in lower health costs, more productivity, and fewer premature deaths can be expected, according to a WHO study in 2012. Nigeria needs a government with the will to improve the access that it desires.
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