Stakeholders at a four-day review and validation workshop on Kano State’s sanitation and water policies have strongly called on the Kano State Government to urgently return the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Agency (RUWASA) to the supervision of the State Ministry of Water Resources.
The participants argued that RUWASA, due to its strategic role in providing water supply and sanitation services across rural communities, should no longer remain under the Ministry of Rural and Community Development.
The call was made during the Stakeholders’ Review and Validation on Sustainable Basic Sanitation Access Roadmap and the Policy Finalisation and Validation Workshops for the Kano State WASH Policy, held in Kaduna from Wednesday to Saturday.
Participants at the meeting stressed that placing RUWASA under the Ministry of Water Resources would improve coordination, strengthen service delivery and ensure better implementation of water and sanitation programmes across the state.
Speaking on the issue, the Permanent Secretary of the Kano State Ministry of Water Resources, Engr. Abdurrazak Haruna, disclosed that the recommendation to return RUWASA to the ministry had already been captured in the revised policy document.
He reaffirmed his commitment to ensuring that once the reviewed document is submitted, he would forward it to the Commissioner for Water Resources for onward presentation to Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf for approval.
Haruna said the ministry would do everything within its capacity to ensure the prompt approval and implementation of the revised document across Kano State.
In his remarks, the Team Lead of the WASH Systems for Health Programme at Self Help Africa, Timothy Ibeawuchi, said the workshop was organised to validate two key documents.
According to him, the first document is the Sustainable Basic Sanitation Access Roadmap for Kano State, while the second focuses on the validation of the Kano State WASH Policy.
He explained that the essence of the workshop was to ensure that all relevant stakeholders contribute their inputs to the documents so that they can collectively take ownership of them.
Ibeawuchi noted that the workshop would help strengthen sanitation and water governance in Kano State and ensure that the final documents reflect the realities and needs of communities across the state.
The four-day workshop brought together government officials, development partners, civil society groups and sector experts to deliberate on strategies for improving access to water, sanitation and hygiene services in Kano State.
