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The Nasarawa state government allocates billions of naira to education every year; yet in many schools across villages, they suffer acute water scarcity, with pupils enduring long hours of thirst and trekking long distances in search of drinking water. As a result, attention is diverted from classroom lessons. This Special Report by USMAN YAKUBU USMAN attempts to liken the plight to the account of the Ancient Marina, where there was water everywhere but none to drink. In this case, resources are made available for social amenities like water in schools but none is available to drink. The consequences are production of materials that are torn between thirst for knowledge and water.
On a typical Wednesday morning not long ago, a Basic 5 pupil of Ukago Primary School, Wamba, named Lukman Mohammed, tried to look at the blackboard but his eyes blurred as he sat with his colleagues in the classroom. That day, his throat became dry, his head felt light and the ground seemed to sway beneath him. Not long, there was a headache, then fever. The thirst he endured gripped him such that he stopped comprehending what the teacher was saying. He was already dehydrated. When asked where he fetches water when thirsty, he said he had to go back home to drink water in Wujji village, almost two kilometres away from school.
On another day, while he was away to drink water, visitors came to the school and shared writing materials. He missed the opportunity to get one.
“They came and shared exercise books and I missed it because I went in search of water to drink,” he said.
He added that they could only get water from the river in the village because the faucets have all gone dry.
Also, Hajara Saidu, a primary two pupil fell victim to the water scarcity lately. Like Lukman, whenever she endured thirst for long hours, her stomach used to ache. Due to water scarcity around the school, she does not drink water until she returns home.
This helpless condition of water scarcity in the school further pushes many pupils to explore dangerous routes and rely on any available options to quench their thirst. For instance, if the rivers are not dry, the pupils follow the inlet to the bush, sharing the flowing water with animals. However, this situation unsettled Abdulhamid Usman, a 38-year-old teacher of the Ukago Primary School in Wamba Local Government Area of the state. He knew that once a pupil raises a hand in class and notices the dry mouth, it was about water, not a question.
One after another, the pupils asked for permission and left the classroom to search for water. Abdulhamid became worried as he tried to stop them, but many evaded him and vanished from sight.
This predicament not only frustrates teachers but also disrupts classroom lessons as pupils often vanish from school premises in the quest to quench their thirst.
“Before the pupils find water to drink, they would have to go beyond the school premises, trekking a long mile to Ungo, Ukaya, and Wujji to fetch as much as they can,” Abdulhamid said.
Yakubu Rabo, the headmaster of the school, is unhappy with the state of the institution he heads with no toilet or running water. Anytime the pupils went out to look for water, he feared an accident because motorcycles and cars rode along the road. The worst often happens; sometimes, when the pupils defecate, instead of washing their bodies with water, they use stones and leaves.
“We don’t have water. If they defecate, the water to drink is already a problem, let alone washing their bodies. They use stones and leaves to clean their bodies. We do not even have toilets. They normally enter the bush to defecate,” Yakubu said.
At the risk of contracting water-borne disease
As these children resort to open defecation and drink contaminated water, health practitioners warn that they risk contracting water-borne diseases like cholera. Bala Gadanga, a director of health services at the Department of Medical Sciences and Technology SAISA University, Sokoto said when water is polluted by stool, the pupils can contract dangerous illnesses such as cholera, dysentery, hepatitis A, giardiasis, poliomyelitis, typhoid fever and intestinal worm infections. The health expert noted that many of those diseases are deadly to human life. Cholera, for instance, can lead to severe diarrhea and vomiting, forcing the victim to lose a lot of body fluid.
“For gastroenteritis, an individual may also experience diarrhea and that might cause dehydration especially in children,” he said.
Bala noted that water from a borehole is preferably safer for pupils to drink.
“The role of the government is very critical because if the government abandons public primary and secondary schools, our children would be at risk of contracting these illnesses. So, the government should provide toilets and water in all the schools,” he said.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) revealed that poor access to clean water in Nigeria significantly contributes to higher morbidity and mortality rates in children under the age of five. As the pupils in Ukago Primary School fall within the age range highlighted by UNICEF, the water they consume daily leaves them vulnerable to disease and untimely death.
According to UNICEF, the use of unhygienic water sources and unsanitary conditions increase vulnerability to water-borne diseases like diarrhea where more than 70,000 children under the age of five every year. The international organization however noted that clean water, basic toilets and personal sanitation are essential to the development and survival of children. It added that individuals contract over 73 per cent of diarrhea and intestinal cases due to a lack of access to clean water and toilets.
The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 6 advocates for safe drinking water; therefore, posits that access to clean water is a right to human life and essential to health, education, and poverty reduction.
According to UNICEF, for Nigeria to achieve this goal by 2030, the country needs to increase its budget to achieve the objectives of Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) set by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Teachers and parents believe that schools and pupils in urban areas benefit more from government projects than those in rural communities, thereby raising the issue of official neglect. However, not granting rural children access to potable water to safeguard their health violates children’s rights according to Nigerian law.
Section 13 of the Child Rights Act of 2003 states that a child has a right to health services. Subsection 1 of the act states that every government, institution, service or body responsible for this is required to provide the child’s best attainable health, even as it mandates the government to ensure the provision of safe drinking water and good hygiene to reduce child mortality rates.
The multi-billion-naira allocations
As many schoolchildren continue to suffer acute water scarcity in villages, interactions with head teachers revealed that officials from the state government have been evaluating schools in rural communities without adequate intervention.
Search reveals that the government has been allocating billions of naira over the years, yet no water in schools.l
For instance, in 2022, the state government budgeted over ₦31 billion for education. Daniel Agyeno, then Commissioner for Finance and Planning, reiterated that education is the first priority for the state, which was why the government allocated a huge amount of money to it. However, the current reality reflects a different picture.
Similarly, the ministry gulped billions more into its coffers. In 2023, it received the highest allocation, amounting to over ₦37 billion, more than any other ministry in the state.
In 2024, the budget significantly increased to nearly ₦41.9 billion. In 2025, the government jointly allocated a staggering ₦78.16 billion to education, Science, and ICT. This whopping amount is larger than any amount budgeted to any other sector last year.
Subsequently, there was a further increase in 2026. When Governor Abdullahi Sule presented the current budget, education consumed over ₦92 billion. The governor said the budget is directed at infrastructure development and strengthening human capital. Nevertheless, pupils in Ukago Primary School and other schools in villages endure hardship due to a lack of water.
Spending on education is not only the state government’s effort. Over the years, the federal government, through the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), has disbursed billions of naira to the state government under its matching grant initiative. These intervention funds are expected to address the challenges of public primary schools across the state.
For instance, in 2019, the state government received over N1 billion. In 2020, the allocation was N715 million. While the funding continued to flow, the federal government disbursed N946.65 million in 2021. Also, between 2022 and 2023, Nasarawa got over N2 billion in allocations.
A search into the funding documents also shows that from 2005 to 2023, the state government received a total of N17.82 billion in UBEC funding from the federal government.
Attempts to speak with officials of the state Ministry of Education proved abortive as of press time. Dr. John D. W. Mamman, the Commissioner for Education, failed to respond to direct messages sent to him. He did not reply to a message sent to his WhatsApp channel, and his mobile phone remained unreachable when attempts were made to contact him.
More schools, more problems
In Gwagi Government Primary School, water scarcity remains the burden of the headmistress, Jumai Dauda, because often, her pupils go to neighbouring houses to beg for water. To address this, she bought a jerrycan and instructed primary five and six pupils to fetch water to store on the school veranda.
However, this measure provided little relief because after a few attempts at the container, it became empty again, thereby restarting the search. The assigned pupils would leave their classes to fill it at a nearby tap, which requires electricity to pump water. If there was a power failure, they would return and endure thirst for the day.
When UBEC officials from the local authority and Abuja visited the school to evaluate its challenges, the headmistress complained about water scarcity. The officials gave her forms to fill out, thereby putting smiles on her face; yet, no relief.
“I fill in forms many times. The staff from UBEC comes to evaluate us many times. The UBEC from Abuja also came to us. I complained about it and the fences, but the borehole is my main problem. That’s the complaint I always fill my form for,” she said.
Before the first term holiday, a horrific incident along the road linking to the neighbouring village forced the headmistress to restrict children from leaving the school premises. A kidnapper grabbed a woman’s daughter and ran into the bush. The incident terrified everyone such that it now becomes a matter of balancing pupils’ safety and satisfying their thirst for water.
“The government should help us. They should help the school generally. We are having problems with water. If they bring even at least a borehole to us, it would help us because the pupils are suffering. Moving the helter-skelter looking for water is bad,” the headmistress said.
Another one, Gwagi Government Primary School serves 108 pupils from primary 1 to 6 with nine teachers. The pupils are drawn from Gwagi, Ungwan Mangoro and Rugan Ardo. Despite their efforts to acquire an education, these pupils consistently grapple with severe water scarcity.
Khadija Suleiman, a parent whose grandchildren, Zainab and Unaisat, attend the school, noted that when children sneak home to drink water, parents must chase them back to the classroom. She revealed that sometimes ago, officials inspected the school field and marked a spot to drill a borehole, but later diverted the project elsewhere. She showed the reporter the area, which community members marked with stones.
“We complained that children are suffering due to a lack of water, and they still took the water project to another place. It’s not proper. We kept quiet because we do not have the power to say anything,” she said.
The plight of LGEA Kose Primary School
Surrounded by farms, rivers, and bushes, LGEA Kose Primary School resembles an institution built in the middle of a forest. Along the access footpath, motorcyclists must constantly dodge small holes and stones before entering the school premises. Yet, the pupils still brave this road daily to attend their lessons.
Sani Yahuza, a class teacher explained that staff and pupils face immense difficulties accessing drinking water. In 2020, the school community celebrated when officials arrived and drilled a borehole. However, the borehole stopped working after just six weeks. When the school reported the failure to the Ministry of Education in Lafia, officials acknowledged the complaint but had not taken action till now. Consequently, the pupils drink from a nearby river.
On a visit to the school, this reporter observed the broken borehole. The handle had slackened completely, thereby making it impossible to pump water. Multiple attempts to operate the mechanism proved futile as nothing came out of the pump head. Furthermore, reddish rust stains dotted the borehole base, showing that the low-quality metal had rapidly deteriorated.
“They did it in 2020. Since they drilled the borehole, it only worked for one and a half months, but up till now, it has not been working again,” Sani said.
The school, which enrols over 87 pupils, serves three local villages, including Kose, Klama, and Bambu. None of these children has been able to access water from the borehole for over five years.
Isyaku Abubakar, a father of two pupils and chairman of the School Management Committee expressed deep frustration over the abandoned project.
“It’s the government that did it. They did it and left some pipes. At least, if there is no food to encourage children to stay in school, there should be water to prevent their thirst,” he said.
Both the teachers and parents in LGEA Kose Primary School remain saddened by the substandard project, which failed barely a month and a half after its construction.
The future of these children
As pupils across many rural schools grapple with a lack of water, Boniface Elvis, an education development expert and managing director of Edugist warned that children without water inside their schools lose vital learning time.
He noted that severe water scarcity dehydrates pupils and teachers, thereby causing fatigue, headaches, laziness, and reduced concentration.
“There would be a low attention span as children would struggle to stay focused in class, especially during hot weather because of the quality of water they drink. Teachers too end up sourcing for water themselves, which diverts time from teaching.”
He explained that these constant interruptions break the cognitive flow of children, making learning disjointed. When pupils leave the room and return, they often struggle to reconnect with the lesson.
Boniface stated that the lack of water triggers higher absenteeism rates and directly undermines teaching and learning. He emphasised the need for safety risks facing the girl-child and its potential for mass dropouts if the situation persists.
“There is low academic performance, which is affected. There is increased dropout risk. Repeated hardship feels burdensome, and children would wonder why they are struggling with basic things like water. Walking to rivers in neighbouring villages, children, especially the girl-child, would be exposed to physical danger and sometimes exploitation.”
To resolve this crisis, he urged the government to provide immediate infrastructural solutions and legislation that mandates boreholes and solar-powered water systems in all rural schools.
