Lagos tasks residents on environmental sanitation

The Special Adviser to Lagos State Governor on Environment, Dr. Taofeek Folami, made the call at the weekend during the October edition of the monthly environmental sanitation exercise monitored in Bariga Local Council Development Area (LCDA) in the state.
Taofeek decried  indiscriminate dumping of refuse into the Lagos canals, saying such habit comes with health hazards and is capable of frustrating attempts to contain the deadly Ebola Virus Disease permanently in the country.
He said: “The reason residents give for the refuse in their canals was that the water current brings the refuse to their community. We know that the refuse does not get into the canals without the human factor. And that was why we have decided to strengthen our advocacy exercise to ensure that residents desist from this act.
“At the moment, some of the canals are under repairs but we have appealed to the residents to desist from dumping of refuse into the canals because when the community gets flooded, it will affect everyone.”
He said the state government will send its monitoring team to the 20 local government areas and 37 LCDA’s in the state to ensure people desist from dumping of refuse into the canals.
Folami’s host, the Chairman of Bariga Local Council Development Area, Hon. Sulaimon Akeem, said the council is making frantic efforts to keep the areas clean.
Answering questions from news men on why most canals in the council area are silted and creating stagnant water, he said, “we have a department in our council saddled with the responsibility of ensuring that the drainage and canals in the council are de-silted often. And with the current situation, it is evident that we need to embark on monthly de-silting exercise to avoid flooding in the council.”
However, he noted that there are some canals that the council does not have the finance and equipment to carry out thorough de-silting exercise on. “Oftentimes, we meet with the Community Development Association, CDAs, and Community Development Committee, CDCs, to sensitise them on what they needed to do in order to keep the council safe from flood, he said.”
Allaying fears of flooding, the state Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Lateef Iborogba, said government has started collecting waste cans for recycling, adding,  “what we would be doing is to strengthen our collection exercise.”
Speaking on the importance of the environmental sanitation period on the last Saturday of each month, Iborogba said, “from our inspection of  councils during the sanitation exercise, it showed that residents have seen the importance of  sanitation exercise. They now stay at home and participate actively in keeping their surrounding clean.”