By Tony Adibe
The United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), on Wednesday, tasked journalists in Nigeria on the need to make access to water and Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) programmes a topical issue in public discourse.
UNICEF, officially known as United Nations Children’s Fund, urged the journalists to give voice to millions of voiceless children in Nigeria as they struggle to get their rights to potable drinking water, WASH programmes, quality healthcare, education, and safety.
The Chief of Field Office, UNICEF Enugu, Mrs Juliet Chiluwe gave the advice during the media briefing on 2023 World Water Day Celebration by UNICEF Enugu Field Office held in Enugu. Chiluwe explained that access to safe drinking water required more investment in building a water system.
According to her, time had come for potable and hygienic water to reticulate well to homes, schools and public places to reduce the stress of children getting accessible water and finding time to meet with other child developmental/educational needs.
“We (UNICEF) are working with the state government and other partners to ensure availability of water. If we continue at the pace we are going, it will take 16 years in Nigeria to achieve access to safe water for Nigeria. We cannot wait that long, hence the need to increase investment in water, sanitation, and hygiene services,” she said.
She said that water-related diseases endanger the lives of 78 million children in Nigeria, stressing that “some of the problems while some children are not enrolled in school is traceable to water unavailability and inaccessibility”.
The chief of field office noted that availability of water would help protect children’s health especially from water-borne diseases and poor hygiene-related diseases. Chiluwe further said: “These children do not have availability of water in their community as we all know water affects the growth of children.
“We call on all stakeholders to be more involving in making water available because only one person does not have capacity to do it so all hands must be on deck to salvage the situation.”
Also in his speech, WASH Specialist UNICEF Field Office, Enugu Mr. Doutimiye Kiakubu, said the commemoration of World Water Day was to create awareness about the importance of water to life. Kiakubu said: “Water is important to health centres, education, nutrition, urban infrastructure, and everything about development.
“Availability of water for consumption is very low so we must always advocate for equitable and just distribution of water resources. Water must be available when you need it and must be free from all kinds of chemicals,” he said. He challenged journalists to do more research on access and availability of potable water in the country.
“Journalists should support UNICEF and millions of Nigerian children by following up on budgetary allocation to water in various states as well as internationally funded water projects from donor agencies,” he added.
