From: Dominic Ogbonna <enyimocha@gmail.com>
Date: 13 July 2011 04:52
Subject: [NIgerianWorldForum] Horrible News: Little Buhari Collapses Into Open Toilet
To: naijapolitics <NaijaPolitics@yahoogroups.com>, Nigerian World Forum <NIgerianWorldForum@yahoogroups.com>, Nigerian Observer group <naijaobserver@yahoogroups.com>, Dandalin Siyasa <dandalin-siyasa@yahoogroups.com>, AfricanTalk <AfricanTalk@yahoogroups.com>, "nigerianid@yahoogroups.com" <nigerianID@yahoogroups.com>
Little Buhari's death in school toilet
THE heart-rending death of an eight-year old primary school pupil of Irepodun Primary School, Ketu in Lagos, who fell into an open dilapidated pit toilet while defecating, underscores the deplorable state of infrastructure in Nigeria's public school system. The death of the pupil is a pointer to the mess in our schools, and the horrifying condition under which our children are learning.
A lot has been said about the pathetic state of infrastructure in our public schools without the authorities doing anything to remedy the situation. The result is that pupils and students in public schools, from primary to tertiary level, daily face acute challenges in a most excruciating learning environment.
Little Lawal Buhari paid the ultimate price for finding himself in one of such blighted schools. In those schools, the children are exposed to disease-causing pathogens in a most unhygienic environment. Since there is no water, the issue of basic hygiene is foreclosed. The pupils defecate without washing their hands and obviously eat with the same hands. It is nauseating.
What else is expected in an environment where there are practically no water and no toilets for students and teachers, who are consequently forced to use nearby bushes when pressed. There are no records of the number of school children who have died or contracted one disease or the other in schools as a result of poor hygienic condition. The frequent outbreak of cholera in different parts of the country, especially, among children, obviously is indicative of this sad situation.
According to reports, little Buhari about a fortnight ago fell into his school's open pit toilet that caved in as he was stooping to ease himself. The boy's corpse was later pulled out of the pit in a most disgusting spectacle. If the boy had not been seen when he went into the ramshackle toilet, there could have been suspicion that he had been kidnapped or used for rituals in our increasingly diabolical society where people get missing daily.
However, his mates saw him when he took permission from the class teacher to use the toilet shortly before closing time. In the absence of a decent toilet, the pupil made straight to the dilapidated pit latrine used by more than 1,000 pupils of the school.
He reportedly spread papers on the dirty floor, in the manner of the pupils, to defecate upon and later throw into the toilet. But unknown to him, the toilet's bricks have been weakened; he fell straight into the six-feet deep pit helplessly as it caved in.
When another pupil who noticed that Buhari had fallen into the toilet went and informed his teachers, they reportedly ignored him. But he persisted until it dawned on them that a disaster had occurred. That was when they began efforts to pull the boy out. But it was too late as he was already dead. His death resulted from a combination of negligence and failure of the system.
News of Buhari's death naturally drew the ire of some young men in the neighbourhood who invaded the school and reportedly pulled down the doors of the toilets used by the teachers, which were locked and not accessible to the pupils. The damage, however, has been done.
The Ketu school disaster is only a tip of the iceberg of the horrible situation in our public schools. All over Lagos, the situation is the same in virtually all public schools. Things are not different in other states. Even public secondary schools and universities are not left out. Undergraduates in many of our institutions help themselves in the surrounding bushes because there are no toilets.
It is unfortunate that the nation finds it difficult to provide toilets or conveniences as part of basic human infrastructure needed. Schools, markets, bus parks, train stations, and indeed all public places are built without toilets. People travel long distances from one part of the country to another without seeing a single convenience on the way.
Across the country, practically no public building has functional toilets. In places where a few exist, they are reserved for the highest officials like the Ketu Primary School case, and so are permanently under lock and key, accessible only to the concerned officials. The rest of the people urinate and defecate in the open, presenting an unfortunate state of affair that reduces Nigerians to the level of sub-humans.
Absence of water and sanitation facilities undoubtedly aggravates the spread of communicable diseases. Few Nigerians wash their hands once they leave their homes until they are back. Market women, snack hawkers, fruit and vegetable sellers, meat sellers, etc, use the same unwashed hands to sell to members of the public. There is urgent need to provide toilets in schools and public places. It is pertinent to ask why schools are built without toilets, or why the toilets are not maintained.
As regards the death of Buhari, the state authorities failed in their responsibility to provide safe and decent toilets when the school was built. That amounts to negligence, for which Buhari's family should be compensated accordingly by the Lagos State authorities, failing which the family ought to seek legal redress. Hopefully, little Buhari's death would mark the beginning of the era of providing safe toilets in public schools, and therefore preventing a recurrence of the ghastly incident.
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