By Rauf Oyewole
The Bauchi State Government and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) have launched Climate Resilience Infrastructure for Basic Services project (CRIBS) to prevent infrastructure destruction in schools and hospitals in the state.
Speaking during the flag off of the project on Monday, the UNICEF's Chief of Bauchi Field Office, Dr Nuzhat Rafique, said that the UN Agency's focus is on children —for the safety and the security of the children, for the well-being of the children, and providing them the best potential to grow to a full man, woman, and the person contributing towards society.
According to her, climate change is not far away. “This is not the future, it has become the present. All this extra high temperature environment, high heat, and then rainstorms blowing the roof out of the school and the primary health care facilities. We all know that already there are thousands of people who cannot reach the health facility and cannot stay there.”
CRIBS is being supported by the United Kingdom International Development in Enugu, Bauchi, Kaduna, Jigawa, Katsina and Gombe where infrastructure will be built, rebuilt and maintained to prevent climate negative impacts on schools and hospitals. The project spans through July 2025 and December 2026.
The UNICEF official said that CRISP is a dream for the state that all the health facilities, schools have water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) and are structured in a way that children can stay safe. “Our mothers can give birth to their children in a safe environment. Our newborns are safe in any space of climate change.”
The State Governor, Bala Mohammed, represented by his deputy, Auwal Jatau, said that the project which is being rolled out by UNICEF has targeted the upgrade of 15 primary healthcare centers and nine primary schools in five local government areas of the state.
He said that the renovation and upgrade of the facilities would go a long way in not just providing a conducive atmosphere for the children to learn and for the healthcare workers to provide quality healthcare service.
He added that would mitigate the negative impact of climate change. “UNICEF has continued to support the policies of the government in areas of healthcare services. delivery, primary education, adolescence and reproductive health, water and sanitation,” he said.
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