By Stanley Onyekwere
A major two-day national workshop aimed at overhauling Nigeria’s struggling urban water sector has opened this morning at the Chelsea Hotel in Abuja, punctuated by a blunt reality check from international development partners: a lack of global funding is no longer an excuse for dry taps.
The high-stakes event, titled “Urban Water Supply Sector Reform in Nigeria: Progresses, Challenges and Way Forward,” has brought together delegation leaders from 25 states, including state commissioners, water utility bosses, and top financial backers like the World Bank, the African Development Bank, and the European Union.
The workshop opened with a keynote address from the Minister of Water Resources and Sanitation, Engr. Prof. Joseph Terlumun Utsev (represented by Director Babarinde S. Mukaila), who underlined the staggering scale of the crisis. According to ministry data, 30% of Nigerians still lack access to basic water supply, while 56% live without basic sanitation services.
However, the opening sessions quickly shifted from diplomatic pleasantries to direct critique.
Taking the podium on behalf of the Development Partners Group, Mahamadou Diarra, the Deputy Country Director for the French Development Agency (AFD), challenged the long-held political narrative that infrastructure projects are stalled due to empty coffers.
“Let me say it right away: the problem is not the funding,” Diarra told the crowded room of representatives of state executives.
“Because we, as donors, have made available immense amounts of money for the states
“What is lacking today is the sustainability of the system,” he added.
International delegates warned that Nigeria is trapped in a “vicious cycle of building and decaying infrastructure.”
The workshop’s core objective over the next 48 hours is to advance advocacy for state water agencies to transition into commercially viable, autonomous entities capable of running 24/7 operations, billing efficiently, and paying their own electricity and chemical maintenance costs without begging for state bailouts.
The pressure is already prompting massive spending commitments from individual states looking to demonstrate readiness for future partnerships.
During the opening panel, Dr. Ubuo Effiong Ubuo, the Commissioner for Water Resources for Akwa Ibom State, broke news by announcing that his state executive council has just greenlit a massive 15 to 16 billion Naira emergency water project.
The aggressive plan aims to build and commission functional water schemes across all 369 political wards before the year concludes.
Meanwhile, representatives from Abia State revealed that they are currently attempting to resurrect more than 58 water schemes left completely moribund by previous administrations.
With France, through the AFD, having already injected over €300 million into local water investments over the last decade, European diplomats made it clear that future financial intervention will be strictly tethered to structural, administrative discipline.
The workshop continues through tomorrow, with state commissioners expected to map out a concrete, unified policy framework to prevent newly built infrastructure from sliding back into decay.
More to follow.
