World Toilet Day: Aliyu advocates private sector

As the Federal Capital Territory Administration joins the rest of the world to celebrate the United Nations World Toilet Day (WTD), FCT Minister of State, Ramatu Tijjani-Aliyu, has called for private sector initiatives to meet the 2025 Goal of ensuring that Nigeria becomes Open Defecation Free (ODF).

Aliyu also called for greater commitment especially at a time when President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration has flagged off the Clean Nigeria Campaign with use the toilet initiative.

She decried the rate of Nigerians with inadequate or total lack of access to toilets, revealing that the Federal Capital Territory has a fair of the over 47 million people lacking access to sanitation and hygiene.

According her, “Nigeria currently has over 47 million people with inadequate or total lack of access to toilets and another troubling 57 million lacking access to potable water. The FCT has its fair share of this disturbing figures.

“Therefore, the 2019 World Toilet Day is coming at a time that the federal government is revving up the political will to combat this scourge through a number of tools and instruments, programmes and initiatives that include partnership with the organized private sector in other to reverse the scourge and build a healthier Nigerian population.

“It saddens my heart to note that currently 102, 000 children die annually due to diseases related to sanitation. We must join hands to reverse this ugly trend,” he said.

The FCT Minister of State called on traditional rulers and all residents of the territory to see themselves as ambassadors and embark on the crusade to educate others on the need to desist from actions such as open defecation and indiscriminate dumbing of refuse.

Read also: What poor access to clean water, decent toilets means to hard-to-reach communities

She affirmed that if the respective authorities fail to resolve this menace, the target to end open defecation in the nation’s capital by 2025 may be unrealistic.

Aliyu vowed that henceforth, the FCT Administration would  work closely with the six Area Councils and other Agencies of Government to scale-up commitment to implement the National WASH Action Plan to end open defecation across the territory.

It could be recalled that the United Nations has declared November 19, as World Toilet Day (WTD), just as the Federal Government had a year ago declared a State of Emergency in the Water Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) sector.