Worried by the poor sanitary condition of Makwala, a community situated in the heart of Keffi town, doctoral students of Mass Communication at the Nasarawa State University Keffi(NSUK) offering Development Communication have enlightened residents of the area on the benefits of clean environments.
Speaking at the event, the Dean, School of Postgraduate Studies at NSUK, Professor Abdullahi Adamu Suleiman, described good sanitary habits as key to healthy living.
Represented by Professor Titilayo Bamidele, the dean said dirty environments trigger disease outbreaks and affects well-being and economic growth.
“Sanitation is very important for us to live a good and quality life and I’m so happy that 80% of us here are women and we are the ones that are custodians of our environment.
“I want to encourage us that in our environment let’s try and maintain good and proper sanitation. Let’s not just throw things around anyhow like the HOD was talking about dumps around those places. These things affect our health, especially children.
“You know when insects or perch on those dumps and come on food children begin to have diarrhoea and you take them to hospital. So it’s important that we keep our environments clean,” the dean said.
The dean, Faculty of Communication and Media Studies in the university, Professor Muhammad Rabiu, commended the students for the initiative and stressed the need for residents to embrace proper waste management and disposal to avoid contracting diseases.
“Any campaign to sensitise people about hygiene is relevant to them and that’s what this is about. Whatever is the status of this place in terms of hygiene, it can be taken higher. Like littering the streets, look at where we’re standing now, you see cans of drinks, you see pure water leather and all that. They are not supposed to be thrown anyhow. They are supposed to be disposed of in a safe place like rubber buckets.
“What I’ve seen here is that condition of people can be improved, can be taken higher, you can see evidence of littering, this shouldn’t be,” Rabiu said.
The head of Mass Communication department, Dr Mohammed Yakubu, lauded the students’ efforts, and urged members of the community to use the campaign to improve.
Chairman of Keffi local government council, Dr Mohammed Damagani, represented by the supervisory councillor for agriculture, stressed that poor sanitation is responsible for outbreak of diseases such as cholera, malaria and typhoid, hence the need for residents to embrace best hygiene practices.
Spokesperson of the class, Godspower Ede said their campaign was informed by poor sanitary condition of the community and the need to enlighten the residents on behavioural change.
“We did our search round and discovered that this is one locality in this town that is densely populated and the people have this nonchalant attitude towards environmental sanitation and we feel we should do it here,” he said.
The campaign featured the presentation of two sanitary waste bins to the community by the students, supported by the course lecturer, Dr Tsegyu Santas who was represented by Dr Godswil Okiyi while the community leader, Bature Samu, appreciated the students for the gesture and promising judicious use of the waste bins.
