The Federal Government has reinstated its commitment to end Open Defecation by 2025 at the ongoing World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden.
Mr Suleiman Adamu, Minister of Water Resources, gave the commitment in statement signed by Mrs Kenechukwu Offie, the Director, Information in the ministry, on Tuesday, August 27, 2019 in Abuja.
The minister said this at a closed-door meeting on the National Action Plan for the Revitalisation of the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Sector in Nigeria at the 2019 World Water Week taking place in Stockholm, Sweden.
Adamu, in his paper entitled: “Open for Business: Building Partnerships for the Revitalisation of the Nigeria WASH Sector”, urged all to give focused attention and consideration to the possibility of establishing a programme in Nigeria.
He said this was to support the actualisation of the goal of the National Action Plan to end open defecation by 2025 and bring water, sanitation and hygiene to all Nigerians by 2030.
He said that the journey to revitalise the WASH sector in Nigeria began in 2017 after the receipt of the worrisome World Bank WASH Poverty Diagnostic Report on the state water supply system.
“And the increasing number of people without access to sustainable sanitation, including those defecating in the open.
“To address the problem of low access to water and poor sanitation in Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari, demonstrated high political commitment on Nov.8, 2018 with the launch of the National Action Plan for the Revitalisation of the Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) Sector and declared a state of emergency for the WASH sector.
“The Federal Government has also made the conscious decision to open up opportunities in the Nigerian WASH sector to the international development community.
“This is to support our efforts through establishment of new partnerships in development cooperation and investments for the development of requisite skills, competences, technologies and financial systems,” he said.
Adamu said: “Our goal is to listen to you and learn from you on what we need do as a government to strengthen our existing partnerships and collaboration as well as build new international development cooperation and private sector relationships to enable us to achieve the SDG 6 in Nigeria.’’
The high point of the occasion was the signing of Memorandum of Understanding between Federal Government of Nigeria and WaterAid.
The Federal Government’s delegation to the 2019 World Water Week include the Minister of Water Resources, the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Water Resources, Mrs Ekaro Comfort, Wash Ambassador, Mrs Ebele Okeke among others.
By Joan Nwagwu
