Tony Okafor,Awka

OPS- WASH ends open defecation for 400 Anambra pupils, teachers


The Organised Private Sector on Water, Sanitation and Hygiene has provided two

ventilated improved toilets for

Migrants Farmer's School,Nnewi, Anambra State, thereby ending open defecation for the pupils and teachers of the four-year-old school.

The National Coordinator of OPS-WASH, Dr Nicholas Igwe, who commissioned the projects on Tuesday also inaugurated a VIP toilet for an indigent family in Uli, in the Ihiala Local Government Area of the state

He said the three projects were

part of moves by the Federal Government to end open defecation in the country.

Igwe said two million Diaspora Nigerians were being mobilised to intervene in the challenges of open defecation, water and sanitation in the country.

Regretting that Nigeria was ranked number one in open defecation in the world, Igwe said government, development partners and nongovernment organisations alone would not solve the problem.

He said between 2016 and 2019, the Federal Government made attempts to make the country open defecation free.

These attempts he said, included initiating P-WASH; bringing private sectors and government stakeholders together; declaration of state of emergency in water, sanitation and hygiene; and the eventual signing of Executive Order 009.

Igwe added, "In May this year, President Muhammadu Buhari ,inaugurated 24-member committee as part of efforts to combat the issue of open defecation and water sanitation challenges.

"Based on the political will of the government, OPS-WASH went into partnership with the Diaspora Commission to mobilise two million diaspora Nigerians to adopt at least a toilet each in schools, markets, motor parks and other public places.

He decried the situation whereby 221,000 Nigerians, out of which 87,000 were children below five years, die yearly from gastroenteritis and related diseases.

While calling on state governments to provide list of projects they would want the OPS-WASH to assist, he urged private sectors in the country to key into the project.

Responding, Bridget Onyedike, a 70 year old basket weaver, who benefited from the pilot toilet facility at Umubazu village, Uli in the Ihiala Local Government Area said she was shocked at the gesture.

In her address, the headteacher of

Migrants Farmer's School,Uju Onwuagba,

said the intervention had helped to ameliorate the plight of teachers and pupils of the school who had no such facility since its establishment in 2016.

Lalasticlala

Other state with open defecation should replicate this.