$700m World Bank water project: Stakeholders call for states’ commitment

Stakeholders have called on states benefitting from the $700 million World Bank-supported Sustainable Urban and Rural Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene (SURWASH) Programme to show political commitment for project sustainability.

This was the consensus among stakeholders at a virtual SURWASH public consultation meeting on Monday, which was organised by the Bread of Life Development Foundation and other stakeholders in the water and sanitation sector.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) recalls that the World Bank had approved a $700 million SURWASH programme in seven states of the country.

The benefitting states are; Delta, Ekiti, Gombe, Imo, Kaduna, Katsina, and Plateau.

Mr Babatope Babalobi, representative of the foundation, said the five-year project would also support Federal Government’s implementation of the National Action Plan, which sought to change the poor narrative in the Water and Sanitation sector.

According to Babalobi, there is need for the World Bank to strengthen its monitoring teams towards ensuring that they get their desired result in improving access to potable water and sanitation for Nigerians.

“We want the World Bank to increase its human capacity presence in the country, lessons learnt from previous interventions showed that the country achieved an unsatisfactory report.

“There is need for a task team leader who will be resident in Nigeria to oversee activities and monitor project implementation,” Babalobi said.

He expressed the need for the Federal Ministry of Water Resources and the seven states to take ownership of the project and ensure that programme implementation guidelines were strictly followed.

Dr Benson Ajisegiri, Director, Water Supply and Public-Private Partnership, noted that the ministry had urged the seven states to set up independent task teams responsible for achieving SURWASH results.

“The consequences would have been much if World Bank and other development partners’ interventions were not involved, so we are focusing on capacity building and institutional strengthening this time around.

“We have seen subsequent interventions with no serious political commitment, like the states bringing people directly to do the job without going through procurement.

“Now, states have set up their own Project Implementation Unit, they must now take the ‘driver’s seat’ and build their capacity for implementation,” Ajisegiri said.

NAN reports that SURWASH will provide six million people with basic potable water services and 1.4 million people access to improved sanitation services.

The programme will deliver improved water sanitation and hygiene services to 2,000 schools and health care facilities and assist 500 communities to achieve open defecation free status.


Source: NAN