According to the United Nations Children’s Fund, 669 local government areas in Nigeria have yet to achieve open defecation-free status.
According to UNICEF, achieving Sustainable Development Goal 6 by 2030 may be unachievable if the government and important stakeholders in Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene, or WASH, do not mobilize to ensure that the country’s 774 LGAs become open-defecation-free.
Dr. Clement Adams, the Officer in Charge of the UNICEF Bauchi Field Office, addressed the concerns on Wednesday during a media dialogue in Azare, Bauchi State, to commemorate World Toilet Day.
He commended the residents of Katagum local government area in Bauchi State for becoming the country’s 105th open defecation-free local government jurisdiction.
He said that the bulk of diseases afflicting people can be linked back to poor sanitation, claiming that a lack of toilets endangers both persons and the environment, and that the statistics are not encouraging.
He said,
“Jigawa is the only state in the country that has all its local government areas certified open defecation free but we believe other states can copy from them to ensure the country achieves the Sustainable Development Goal Number 6 by 2030.”
The UNICEF OIC emphasized the importance of increased collaboration with relevant stakeholders, stating that governments must guarantee that all hands are on deck to fill the gap created by the shortfall.
Nuhu Zaki, the Bauchi State Commissioner for Water Resources, had previously expressed the state government’s commitment to achieving open defecation-free status in all 20 LGAs by 2025.
He emphasized that the state government was able to deliver 8 local government areas as LGA ODF-wide, which are Dass, Warji, Shira, Gamawa, Bogoro, Ganjuwa, Toro, and Katagum.
He highlighted that a further 5,934 localities were open defecation-free, or ODF, and that two more local government areas, Bauchi and Zaki, were at various stages of becoming ODF.