afrol News, 26 July - Nigeria's newly reappointed Minister of Water Resources, Mallam Muktar Shagari has assured that the federal government is set to achieve 80 percent water supply to Nigerians by year 2007 and enjoined state governments to pay more attention to water supply.

Mallam Shagari disclosed this recently in his office shortly after his resumption of duty as Minister of Water Resources, according to a press release by the Nigerian government.

The Minister explained that government is soon to contract more dams with a view to achieving adequate Water supply to Nigerians adding that attention will be focused on smaller dams for ease of construction and maintenance.

He further reiterated that the most daunting problem remains the provision of Water supply, which he assured that at the end of 2007 the Ministry will accomplish 25,000 water schemes across the country.

The announcement of Minister Shagari implies that the Nigerian federal government is to speed up its investment in the water sector. In order to ensure adequate and regular supply of potable water to all Nigerians, the Nigerian government already in 1996 had adopted a National Water Resources Masterplan.

This 1996 Masterplan targets among others, the improvement of water supply levels and the upward review of water supply tariffs. The plan recommends an annual investment of naira 14.5 billion from 1996 to 2020 for the water sector, with a view to ensuring that 80 percent of the country's population would have access to adequate water supply by the year 2020. The new target year now has been set to 2006.

According to Global Water Supply & Sanitation Assessment 2000, the percentage of rural water supply coverage in Nigeria is 33 percent, which is quite small compared to other West African countries. On a national level, only 43 percent of the population has access to safe potable water.

Nigeria however has large water resources with surface and underground water reserves currently estimated at 267 billion cubic metres and 57 billion cubic metres respectively. This is seen as abundant to provide clean water for the country's estimated population of 125 million.

The federal government is currently also encouraging private sector participation in the State Water Board supply services. The states of Lagos, Kaduna and Borno are already implementing private sector participation in their water policies.

By staff writer

© afrol News

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