Stakeholders seek construction of more toilet facilities in Bauchi

Water Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) from the 20 local government areas of Bauchi State have called on the state government to establish more toilet facilities in public places.

The stakeholders stated this Tuesday at a cluster meeting on Vote4WASH, held at the Development Exchange Centre (DEC) in Bauchi, organized by the Network for Civil Society Organizations in Water and Sanitation (NEWSAN) with funding by the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC). According to the stakeholders, the pledge cards will be presented to politicians who will come to their local government areas to campaign for the 2019 general election.

They resolved that they will not accept any fake promises from politicians. They said that lack of toilet facilities in public places such as parks, schools, markets, hospitals, churches and mosques across the state posed a serious threat to the health of the people across the local government areas in the state.

The WASH stakeholders decried lack of good hospitals, potable water and good roads in the state, adding they have presented all their challenges through the pledge-cards for presentation to all the politicians that will come to ask for their votes.

” We are appealing to the government and philanthropists to establish public toilets, bathrooms, water taps or borehole in public places. Our health is in danger with the indiscriminate defecation, urination and throwing of used toilet tissues because they emit unbearable odour,” they said.

Speaking earlier, the State Coordinator of NEWSAN, Ezekiel Sukumu, charged the stakeholders to identify their priority needs on water sanitation and hygiene from their respective communities that will improve their health care status and called on candidates contesting for various elective offices across the state to provide water, sanitation and hygiene facilities in their communities.

“Make your promise campaign by politicians” will be launched in the state next year, thus stakeholders should identify their priority needs on water sanitation and hygiene from their respective communities that will improve their health care status,” he said.

Credit: Vanguard