For those who engage in passing bodily waste in open areas, it is just one call of nature that they must answer anytime they are pressed. It doesn’t matter where and how.
This is the mindset that thrives in many parts of Abuja, the nation’s capital city, where ugly and irritating sights of faeces are fast becoming very common.
Although, the menace of indiscriminate urination and defecation is more prevalent in the satellite towns of the nation’s capital, these eyesores have also become very common in major streets in highbrow areas like Gwarimpa, Jabi, Maitama, Wuse, Utako, Garki among others.
Market places, motor parks, green areas, drains, bus stops in Abuja have become easy to reach toilets in the absence of alternatives.
As it is, one can hardly walk on many streets in the FCT and breathe fresh air as of this ugly practice which leaves the environment fouled with the stench from faeces and urine that stares at passersby. It is not uncommon to see people cover their noses with their hands or handkerchief to avoid inhaling the foul odour while passing through mostly lonely thoroughfares. This is especially worse in the early hours of the day as the environment may have been fouled during the night.
Areas like Area One Roundabout, Garki, Okonjo Iweala Street in Utako, Julius Berger Bus stop, Mabushi Roundabout to mention just a few, have gained notoriety for this.
The situation is so appalling that there are fears among residents that the act coupled with the rains might result to possible outbreak of diseases in the Federal Capital Territory if not checked.
The unending mass influx of people into the city on daily basis and the absence of commensurate public toilet facilities have been observed as one the major factors responsible for the menace in the territory.
Investigations by The Nigerian Times have revealed that thousands of people trooping into the FCT have no legitimate homes as they cannot afford to rent the exorbitant apartments owned by Abuja shylock land lords.
They then take shelter in makeshift structures, uncompleted buildings, abandoned vehicles, motor parks, market places, to name just a few.
Some other residents especially those in the satellite towns live in homes though legitimate but without toilet facilities.
The result is; many people convert every available corner and environment to their toilets. The perpetrators also see this practice as normal as nothing is being done by authorities to deter them.
Observers have pointed out that the absence of public toilet facilities, failure of some house owners to build houses with toilets, limited land space and deep-rooted cultural and social norms that have established open defecation as an acceptable practice are factors responsible for this growing menace.
In a recent in a recent interview, the newly appointed Acting Director of the Abuja EnvirentalPronmotecBoard (AEPB),tion Lawan Shehu, shocked many residents when he bluntly ruled out the absence of public toilets as a factor responsible for the menace.
Shehu who assumed leadership of the Board barely last month insisted that the FCT was not short of public toilets and urged residents to take advantage of conveniences in all public buildings.
“The problem of open defecation is not that of inadequate public conveniences but that of attitude of the residents.
“It is not possible to have conveniences in every part of the city but people should take advantage of such facilities in hotels, plazas and other such public buildings when they are pressed.
“Provision of such toilet facilities is in fact, a precondition for the approval of building plans for such huge commercial structures,’’ he said.
However, in what seems to be a lack of understanding among agencies of the FCTA, the FCT Primary Health Care Development Board had on August 28, blamed open defecation on lack of functional sanitation facilities in public places in the city.
On its part, it said it plans to build public toilets in strategic locations in the territory to prevent outbreak of communicable diseases as a result of open defecation.
The Director, Disease Control Department of the board, Dr. Matthew Ashikeni, who disclosed this at the National Task Group and Sanitation meeting in Abuja, said the project would be a Public Private Partnership initiative.
Some FCT residents who spoke to The Nigerian Times expressed shock at the position of the Acting Director of the AEPB and dismay at his his suggestion for people to just run to any hotel or plaza any time they are pressed in the public.
According to shop owners and managers of some plaza and hotels in the city, such an “utterance is ridiculous” insisting that the idea is not realistic.
“It is not possible for us to allow just anybody to come and use our toilets just like that. We may decide to grant you access if you come to our shop to patronise us but we are not under any mandate to open for every Tom, Dick and Harry. For the AEPB director to make such a comment is strange and funny,” said a shop owner at ABM plaza in Utako, Nze Donatus.
Checks by The Nigerian Times revealed that conveniences in hotels, eateries are only open to patrons and as such, members of the public can not just have access by the flick of the fingers.
For plazas, in most cases, the toilets are usually under lock and key restricting access only to occupants or shop owners.
With this, it is practically impossible for members of the public to make use of such facilities, putting to question the theory of the new AEPB director.
Corroborating, a security guard under the employment of Lucky Guards, attached to the plaza told our correspondent that it is not possible for people to just walk to any shop and demand for toilet key.
The guard, who pleaded anonymity, said they will simply have their request turned down “because we don’t know you.”
He however, said if such a person had visited a shop in the plaza and after doing business with them, ask to make use of their toilet, they could oblige by letting him have the key.
Commenting on the issue, Manager of Gouba plaza, Paul Okocha told The Nigerian Times: “People can’t just come here and use our toilet. They must have a business to do here before we can open our toilets for them if they want to use it.”
Okocha, who said each floor of the plaza has toilets said they have no agreement, whatsoever, with the FCT authorities that may warrant them to open their facilities to whosoever feels like easing his or herself.
Other public places like hotels also shared similar comments on the issue.
When The Nigerian Times accosted the AEPB acting director to explain his earlier comment, the Special Assistant to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nosike Ogbuenyi prevented him from responding to the question.
The AEPB director neither responded to further questions put forward to him by our correspondent who sought to know what becomes of the previous promises of deploying mobile toilets made repeatedly by the Board under the administration of his predecessors.
Instead, Ogbuenyi responded by saying that the acting director was still understudying and having meetings with the various departments of the Board.
According to him, Shehu is a very hard working fellow who has a lot to offer and by the time he settles down properly, he will make impressive marks on the mandate given to him.
Admitting the inadequacy of public toilets in the nation’s capital, the Head, Information and Public Outreach of the Abuja Environmental Protection Board, (AEPB), Joe Ukairo had said recently in an interview with The Nigerian Times that, “we quite know that the available ones may not be adequate because of the influx of people into the FCT.
“The demography of FCT is now challenging because a lot of people are trooping into the FCT and these must not be translated negatively.”
Like he had done in the past years, he still assured concerned Nigerians that the Board is partnering with the private sector to deploy more public toilets to the FCT.
“The AEBP as a regulatory agency is partnering with private individual because government funding is dwindling, so government cannot handle it alone. We are partnering under the Public Private Partnership (PPP) to make public toilets available,” he said.
This was as he appealed to the private sector to partner with the agency in other to tackle the lingering menace in the FCT.
However, Ukairo thinks: “Providing a million toilets cannot solve the problem of indiscriminate defecation and urination in the FCT because it is an attitude thing.”
Confirming the health risk this practice constitutes, health and environmental experts said several illnesses that are presently ravaging various communities resulted from open defecation.
According to a Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) specialist, Mr Saaondo Anom, over 113 million Nigerians relieve themselves in the open because they lack sanitation facilities.
Anom, who was speaking recently during a workshop organized by UNICEF (United Nation Children Fund) and WASH recently in Enugu, said the problem is further aggravated by the fact that about 63 million Nigerians lack access to improved sanitation.
While these persons are relieving themselves in the open, he said they release over 10 millions viruses into the environment which are responsible for several illnesses that are presently ravaging various communities.
“Do you know that a tea spoon of shit, or in other words a lethal dose, just one gram of human feaces can contain more than 10 million viruses, one million parasites, 1000 parasites cysts and 1000 parasites eyes?
“One can only begin to imagine the amount of infections we voluntarily release into the communities which in turn come to harm us,” the expert said.
Also emphasing the danger of open defecation recently in an interview in Abuja, AEPB’s Assistant Director, Environmental Health and Safety, Mrs Kate Ocheze, advised residents of Abuja to desist from open defecation and cultivate the habit of using toilet facilities to avoid spread of diseases.
She said that human waste, if not properly managed, posed a serious threat to public health and the environment.
Ocheze regretted that in spite of the health hazards associated with open defecation, many residents of some slums in Abuja still indulged in the act.
Her words: “Human excreta are a major threat to public health and the environment if not properly managed through provision of toilet facilities.
“Many people end up in hospitals as a result of consuming water contaminated by faecal water or untreated sewage,” she said.
If toilet facilities are not adequately provided in the FCT, the territory would risk being polluted, resulting in a rise in preventable diseases such as cholera, typhoid, diarrhoea and polio among others.”
“Some people residing in the suburbs of FCT sleep in shopping malls, markets and under the bridges and they end up polluting the city by defecating and urinating into drains and open spaces.
“The need for corporate outfits to provide toilets for public use should therefore be encouraged to prevent environmental pollution.”
It is widely believed that deploying more public toilet facilities to replace the few available ones which are even not functional, will go a long way to address the problem.
Observers say they are tired of government’s never ending promises of bringing in more public toilet facilities.
It thus behooves on the AEPB to make good it promises of many years expediently if the Board is truly committed to solving this problem because residents are longing for relief from this menace.
Culled from Nigerian Times
