Of course, it’s unnatural for any person, group, or authority to invite disease. However, our separate and collective inactions covertly ‘lure’ diseases to creep into our communities; most times in an epidemic manner. We shall later return to explain this view in the succeeding paragraphs of this discourse.
An elaborate report recently published by the Daily Trust newspaper showed that a total of 4,778 people died of cholera in Nigeria between 2020 and 2024. This is according to data obtained from the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC). This is even as the same period recorded a total of 155,000 suspected cases. The year 2021 had the highest statistics of 3,604 deaths and 111,062 suspected cases.
The report also indicates that within 2025 alone, over 300 deaths have been recorded including the 179 fatalities recorded from the 12,052 suspected cases in Zamfara state as at September 2025. Two weeks ago, the Bauchi State Deputy Governor Auwal Mohammed Jatau confirmed 58 fresh deaths from 258 new cases across 14 local government areas of the state. Bauchi, Jigawa, Kano and Zamfara states accounted for 53 percent of all cases.
The surge in cholera deaths is happening despite billions of naira reportedly spent by the government and international partners to curb the disease. These funds include annual budgetary allocations running into millions of naira; a $700 million World Bank loan secured to provide water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) facilities across the country; a $2 million United Nations’ aid; hundreds of thousands of Oral Cholera Vaccine (OCV) doses donated by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Caused by vibrio cholerae bacterium and stimulated by poor sanitation, cholera is an acute diarrhoea infection transmitted mainly through contaminated food and water. The outbreak peaks during the rainy season, from May to October, as flooding and contaminated water sources worsen the spread. Cholera symptoms include excessive watery stooling, muscle cramps, severe dehydration and vomiting.
Late President Buhari once mentioned that access to piped water services and improved sanitation, which in 1990 respectively stood at 32 percent and 38 percent had declined to 7 percent and 29 percent in 2015; noting that Nigeria ranked second in the global rating on open defecation because about 25 percent of its population practise open defecation.
The UN, through the Nigeria Humanitarian Fund, released $2 million to sustain the response to a cholera outbreak in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa in 2018. The WHO donated 1.3 million doses of oral cholera vaccine to Bauchi in three yearsto fight outbreaks in high-risk areas of the state. In 2024, the UNICEF also donated 600,000 doses of oral vaccine to Borno State to stem a cholera outbreak following devastating floods caused by Alau Dam collapse.
It would be recalled that in spite of the interventions received from international partners to support Nigeria in managing cholera in recent years, the Nigerian government in December 2021 secured a $700 million loan from the World Bank to implement water projects across the country. The money according to the then Minister of Water Resources, Suleiman Adamu, was going to the state governments to improve their water supply situation.
It’s really mind-blowing that the federal government took loan and gave to states which is the statutory tier of government that is responsible for making sure that water runs in the taps of their residents. Provision of clean water is not the responsibility of the federal government, which is why it does not have a federal water board. Maybe we should re-name the Ministry of Water Resources to Federal Water Board.
While states in the federation could be held responsible for their failure to provide their residents with access to clean water, the failures on the part of the 774 LGAs in the country is worse. As the tier of government that is closest to the people and responsible for public sanitation, their inactions on environmental sanitation implicitly invited cholera since cholera is a disease that thrives in areas with poor sanitation. Huge dumpsites of un-cleared solid wastes are ‘convenient’ sources of cholera, a disease that has been eradicated in some African countries.
Given the situation on ground, one is prompted to conservatively believe that very few of the entire number of LGAs in the country have solid waste disposal trucks (which we call “motar kwasan bola” in Hausa). In the past, the local government sanitary inspectors (whom we call “duba-garis in Hausa) were in charge of sanitation and the clearing of garbage from refuse dumpsites around the town. Nowadays, the mandate of public health departments in most LGAs in the country has been reduced to mere vaccination centres; completely abandoning sanitation matters and the activities of sanitary inspectors.
Where elected LG chairmen have the love of their communities at heart, one of the first procurement orders that should interest them on assumption of duty is the purchase of one or two solid waste disposal trucks. Unfortunately, the first procurement order that comes to their mind is the purchase of a SUV jeep and a Hilux van for themselves; and sometimes too, a big car for the LG First Lady. This is how governance failures invariably invite cholera.
Besides, many of today’s LG chairmen are not even aware of the legislative powers vested in them in the governance structure of the country. Mortality rates from cholera as statistics in the previous paragraphs show wouldn’t have been as high as recorded in the past five years if, for example, at least one day is set aside every month when movement of persons would be restricted for the purpose of environmental sanitation. Some people would argue and ask why people would have to be compelled to clean their surroundings on a monthly basis; a routine they should carry out on their own.
Yes, this shouldn’t be the case where citizens grow up with ethical values and a national orientation that is culturally inherent in them. But because indiscipline came to uproot the culture of decency that once defined the life of Nigerians, LG authorities need to enact laws that would encourage personal hygiene of individuals, and by extension, ensure community sanitation. LGAS could also make laws that would ban open defecation and enforce penalties where it persists. May Allah inspire all the 774 LG chairmen in the country to reinvigorate, empower, and support environmental health workers to do the job they were trained for so that Nigeria could become a free cholera society, Amin.
