DWINDLING ACCESS TO CLEAN WATER
Water is essential to life. The authorities should provide water for the people
A recent World Bank report on Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) sector paints a scary picture on how lack of access to this vital resource impacts negatively on the livelihoods of many Nigerians, in both urban and rural areas. It is a report that should be taken seriously by the relevant authorities with both short and long-term solutions. While the minimum acceptable range an individual needs is between 12 and 16 litres per day, the average amount of water each Nigerian receives is put at nine litres and the quality is not guaranteed. Meanwhile, even though an estimated 1,239 number of waterworks are connected to urban water utilities across the 36 states and the FCT, less than 50 per cent of them are functional, according to a report by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). Yet water, sanitation and hygiene are essential for sustainable development.
In many rural communities in our country today, the challenge is critical as women and children trek long distances to fetch water from streams and ponds that are contaminated. Even in the so-called modern cities like Lagos, and Abuja, the federal capital, a large proportion of people have no access to drinking water and, as a joint World Health Organisation (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) recently observed, many often resort to using any available space for their convenience. For those who can afford it, boreholes are indiscriminately dug. But that too constitutes its own problems as it undermines the water table and threatens future supply of the commodity. In the absence of water from piped supplies and protected wells, millions of Nigerians living in both rural and urban areas consume what is available.
In its report, ‘High and Dry: Climate Change, Water and the Economy’ a few years ago, the World Bank said: “Water scarcity, exacerbated by climate change, could cost some regions up to six per cent of their GDP, spur migration and spark conflict.” The report claimed that climate-driven water scarcity could hit economic growth by up to six per cent in some regions and that the combined effects of growing populations, rising incomes and expanding cities would see demand for water rising exponentially, “while supply becomes more erratic and uncertain.” The report particularly contains a serious warning for Nigeria that is yet to be heeded. “Food price spikes caused by droughts can inflame latent conflicts and drive migration. Where economic growth is impacted by rainfall, episodes of droughts and floods have generated waves of migration and spikes in violence within countries,” it said.
While the United Nations General Assembly has recognised drinking water and sanitation as human rights, meaning that everyone must have access to them, the former still remains a serious problem for majority of Nigerians. Incidentally, when former President Goodluck Jonathan launched the water road map in January 2011, the administration announced some “quick measures to accelerate water coverage”, after releasing some intervention funds for some projects: drilling of motorised borehole in each of the 109 senatorial districts of the country, rehabilitation of 1000 hand pump boreholes in 18 states and installation of some special treatment plants, and completing all abandoned water projects. Unfortunately, none of these short-term measures have been met.
Since access to clean water remains a serious problem that must be tackled in Nigeria, we call on authorities in the 36 states to invest more in providing this precious liquid to all Nigerians. In its absence, Nigerians will continue to be susceptible to seasonal outbreaks of cholera and other water-borne diseases to our collective shame.
