‘Those that defecate in the open eat it’

Cross River State government has formed sanitation committees in most of the local government areas of the state with powers to discipline defaulters. The government has also embarked on massive campaign to dissuade people from defecating in the open in order to reduce the extent of health hazard posed to members of the public.
In an interview, Emori said that they have established a Water Supply Sanitation and Hygiene Committee (WASHCOM) in many communities in the state to help enforce the no-open defecation order and with power to punish.
“They have powers to enforce some of their rules and regulations. Any community or whoever defaults, whichever community, WASHCOM can exercise such powers on them.  They have even taken some persons to court on their own because they have the power to do so.  The various executives at different levels of WASHCOM also help to implement and maintain water supply and sanitation as well as protect water equipment supplied by government to the local communities,” he said.
The sanitation boss said the local sanitation committees have, in exercising their powers, publicised their catch-phrase – You’ll eat and drink your shit – where they make defaulters to clean up their waste.
“In doing this, many have ended up drinking neighbours’ or other people’s faeces.  This has made many in the local communities to join forces with WASHCOM to enforce the no-open defecation in the state.  And because those that defecate in the open are made to pay some fines which is also shared to members of the sanitation committee, you find that there is active interest in the task to discourage open pollution,” he also said.
This action has encouraged many that did not have their own toilets to ensure that not only do they construct theirs but they also ensure that no one defecates in their neighbourhood which eventually attracts flies or poses other risks to them.
Emori stated that they have also intervened in many communities where they now have open-defecation free environments.  “Private people have even cashed in in Yakurr LGA where they have come in to build commercial latrines.  This has further reduced open defecation which was rampant there before.
“From our intervention, too, many local communities are now aware that some water borne diseases which before now they saw as witchcraft, comes from water, like guinea worm disease, for instance. Now, we are happy to say that we have eradicated that from many communities.”
He warned that no one should defecate in the open because one gram of faeces carries over a billion bacteria, adding that faeces attracts flies which have no boundary.
“I want to equally advise that we should persist in hand-washing and washing of whatever that we eat with clean water. We must also enforce environmental sanitation.”