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Ekiti State Government has called on key stakeholders in the Water,
Sanitation and Hygiene sectors to support the ongoing Sustainable
Urban Rural Water Supply Sanitation and Hygiene (SURWASH) Program in
order to achieve the desired goal of guaranteeing adequate water
supply, sanitation and hygiene services to all parts of Ekiti State.
Speaking in Ado Ekiti at a forum tagged “Stakeholders’ Engagement”,
the Special Adviser to the Governor on Infrastructure and Public
Utilities, Prof. Mobolaji Aluko explained that the meeting was
organized to deepen the strategies for results from the SURWASH
program.
Professor Aluko stressed that the SURWASH program was tailored to
ensure success and have enormous impact on the benefiting States,
adding that the result based approach was to drive efforts of
Stakeholders at improving citizens’ access to sustainable and safely
managed Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) services.
According to him, Ekiti is the only State in the South-West and one of
seven States across the country benefiting from this World
Bank-assisted project.
Assuring that the State would achieve the projected target when the
program is completed in 2027, Aluko however emphasized the need for
the State Government and all stakeholders to live up to their
responsibilities and take ownership of the project to guarantee
success.
In her goodwill message, the Speaker of the State House of Assembly,
Rt. Hon Olubunmi Adelugba pledged the continued support of the State
Legislators for efforts to develop the State.
Rt. Hon. Adelugba who lauded the efforts of both the immediate past
administration and the Biodun Oyebanji’s government for attracting
development partners to the State, said that their contributions were
praise-worthy, with an indication that her interest in the WASH sector
predated her assumption of the Speakership position.
The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Infrastructure and Public
Utilities, Engineer Olumide Ajayi, in his remarks, enumerated the
gaps yet to be filled in the WASH sector in the state, and charged the
Implementing Agencies on SURWASH program to ensure good job and
follow the rules for implementation and disbursement purposes,
stressing that the World Bank would only disburse for work done
according to specifications and due independent verification.
Ajayi added that consideration must be given to environmental and
social safeguard impact on this program as well as the gender
mainstreaming, saying non-compliance to rules attached to all
Disbursement Link Indicators (DLIs) would lead to non-disbursement.
The Program Coordinator Engineer Stephen Adewumi who appreciated the
level of efforts put in place by the State Government , sought
support and collaboration from the stakeholders for sustainability of
SURWASH program in the state, while the Program Monitoring and
Evaluation Officer _Mr. Femi Olatunji outlined among other things
the various incentives associated with various Disbursement Link
Indicators.
The Stakeholders’ meeting was attended by top Government functionaries
including the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon.
Olubunmi Adelugba, Special Advisers to the Governor for Education and
Government Reforms (Dr Kofoworola Aderiye and Mr Seun Fakuade
respectively) and several Permanent Secretaries and Executive
Secretaries.
Other attendees included the Civil Society Organizations, private
water operators and Water Consumers Associations, WASHCOM, State
Program Implementation Unit, LGAs’ WASH officers as well as
Implementing Agencies.
It would be recalled that seven States are benefitting from the World
Bank-assisted $700million SURWASH program. The benefiting States are
Ekiti, Delta, Katsina, Kaduna, Gombe, Imo and Plateau for a period of
six years.
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