As part of effort towards maintenance and sustainability
of Sustainable Rural Water Supply Sanitation and Hygiene (SURWASH)
Program facilities and others Water supply facilities across the
state, the State Small Towns, Rural Water Supply, Sanitation Agency
EK-STRUWASSA has held a 3-day stakeholders engagement workshop for Local Area Mechanics (LAM) who are private independent members of the
communities skilled in the operation and maintenance of hand pump and solar motorized Boreholes at the Local Government level.
Addressing participants at the training programme in Ado-Ekiti, the
General Manager of EK-STRUWASSA, Mr Ayo Alegbeleye explained that the
Workshop was organized with the aim of establishing and
operationalizing an effective Implementation of National Village Level Operation and Maintenance ( VLOM) system across the Local Government Areas of the State .
He noted that the programme which was designed to ensure 100 percent
functionality of public water points in the state expressed hope that the initiative will go a long way in addressing the issue of broken down and non functional public water facilities many of which according to him usually had minor faults that could be repaired with a token amount if promptly reported by the affected
communities.
He thereby urged the Community stakeholders to take ownership of their
Water Supply facilities and ensure proper operation and maintenance of facilities towards ensuring sustainability and durability of the
facilities.
The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Infrastructure and Public
Utilities, Engr. Olumide Ajayi in his own remarks, described the
training as timely adding that it will strengthen the sustainability
aspect of SURWASH program.
He charged participants to use the skills acquired to assist
communities to repair and ensure 100 percent functionality of water
points and also help to properly maintain other water facilities
across the State.
The Permanent Secretary advised participants to always go for
monitoring and give monthly report to WASH Departments in the LGAs
through the VLOM unit and not to wait until the water facilities fail
noting that maintenance is very key towards sustainability.
One of the UNICEF facilitators from Federal Ministry of Water
Resources and Sanitation, George Bekinso during his presentation
highlighted their roles to be, Signing of Memorandum of understanding
with the LGAs WASH for repairing services, patronizing quality spares
part for repairing, reporting serious Technical problems to the LGAs
WASH Departments and advising Communities on good usage of WSF.
He thereby admonished them to ensure that the purpose of domesticating
and implementing the VLOM strategy in the State is not defeated.
The technical and practical sections which which were the peak of the
workshop were handled by the state coordinator of UNICEF programme
from Gombe State, Mr Abubakar Abdullahi with teaching the LAM on how
to repair with adequate tools and later went to some sites to repair a
fetching points in Orerewu and some other parts of Ado-Ekiti.
One of the trained participants Mr Ogunjobi Bukola thanked Ekiti State
Government for organizing the impactful workshop and solicited support for repair tool kits for the Local Area Mechanics (LAM) promising, to put all practical training received into practice in a bid to ensure 100 percent functionality of community based public Water supply facilities across the LGAs of the State.