NIGERIA: Making villages hygienic, one by one

LOKOTO, 18 February 2008 (IRIN) - “Have you washed your hands?” the headmaster of a primary school in a village in northern Nigeria asked 160 children standing in line one morning before starting class.

“Yes master!” answered the youthful, enthusiastic crowd.

This daily ritual has become a game, said Sani Marafa, the headmaster at the school which is in Lokoto, a community of some 50 mud and brick houses 20km from Niger State's capital, Minna.

“The children weren't used to washing their hands in the morning,” he told IRIN. “They didn't know the importance and benefit of using latrines.”

He showed IRIN many drawings he uses to explain basic hygiene to students and little games he has devised.

Two wells

But it is not just games and drawings that have improved the hygiene of Lokoto. Water came to the village in 2003 when Niger State government, with support from the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), bored two wells in the village.

Before that, villagers would walk 3km to the river to find drinking water and bathe. “We used to take leaves or maize sticks to clean ourselves after defecating,” Shiatu Sule, one of the residents of Lokoto, said with a little laugh.

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