Half way through the 6-yr period the Sustainable Urban and Rural Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene (SURWASH) to implement its mandate, the seven participating states are alleging undue interference by the supervising ministry.
The programme consist of financing by utilizing a $700m investment financing instrument that is being used to facilitate technical assistance for states and selected implementing institutions to address critical institutional development.
Participating states, Delta, Ekiti, Gombe, Imo, Kaduna, Katsina and Plateau, are expected to fund projects from their state budgets and after verification by an independent verification agent before reimbursement by the World Bank.
A SURWASH official in one of the participationg states, Abdullahi Korau, however said, presently, midway into the programme, the sudden and immediate removal of the National Coordinator who has been tailoring the stewardship of the programme, under the Minister of Water Resources, who put his personal asistant to now head the programme.
He said at the moment implementing states are being expected to give gratification before their entitlement are processed for payment, and therefore called on the federal government to intervene in the matter.
The SURWASH programme was designed to ensure our assets and services for WASH are sustainably managed and accessible to all Nigerians, achievable by 2030, and to meet the SDG targets 6.1 & 6.2 for water and sanitation.
The programme is the culmination of the collective and relentless drive of the Federal Ministry of Resources which began in 2019 with a view to support the implementation of the National Action Plan (NAP) for the revitalization of Nigeria’s WASH sector that was approved by the Federal Executive Council in 2018, launched by President Muhammadu Buhari as he declared a state of emergency in the WASH sector.
