Set back for FG’s move to attain open defecation-free status

Investigation by Daily Trust has found that settlements outside Abuja, the seat of government that are not connected to the city’s sewage system are forced to dispose of their faeces freely in the open.In Nyanya and Mararaba, a suburb of the FCT, it has now become a booming business for owners of sewage evacuation trucks.Residents […]

Investigation by Daily Trust has found that settlements outside Abuja, the seat of government that are not connected to the city’s sewage system are forced to dispose of their faeces freely in the open.
In Nyanya and Mararaba, a suburb of the FCT, it has now become a booming business for owners of sewage evacuation trucks.
Residents need about N15,000 and above for their sewage to be evacuated and because there are no properly structured disposal system in the area, the evacuators empty their content on farms, the open fields and ponds.
Malam Isa Sani, one of the truck operators told Daily Trust that “We charge about N15,000 to evacuate a sewage and we also get people who come to book us to dispose the faeces on their farms and if nobody comes forward we dispose it in the bush.
“When we drop the faeces on those farms, the farmers will leave it for about three months before they will start planting. It helps farmers now that fertiliser is very costly,” he added.
 It would be recalled that the Register Environmental Health Officers Council of Nigeria, Mr Augustine Ebisike recently raised an alarm on the indiscriminate management of human waste in the country.
Ebisike said that human waste was being disposed into water bodies and in the bush without following any laid down procedure.