August 2024 The reality of urban sanitation workers in Lagos, Nigeria Basirat Oyalowo, Taibat Lawanson and Anthony Akpan
Dislodgement plant workers and their trucks at Lekki, Lagos
Sanitation workers in Lagos, Nigeria, are vital yet often overlooked contributors to urban health. This first blog in a two-part series by Basirat Oyalowo, Taibat Lawanson, and Anthony Akpan delves into their essential roles, the stigma they endure, and the harsh conditions they face. Through the 'Hidden World of Lagos Sanitation Workers’, discover how recognizing and supporting these unsung heroes can transform urban waste management and improve city-wide hygiene. Stay tuned for the next part, where the research team highlights the crucial institutional support needed to secure and uplift the precarious livelihoods of Lagos's sanitation workers!
Sanitation workers play an important role, contributing significantly to the safety and well-being of cities. Though their services go mostly unrecognized, they are indispensable actors in urban waste (and waste water) management – a process that comprises of fecal waste containment, collection, transport, treatment, and final disposal or reuse, going beyond mere toilet provision. Given the health risks associated with large populations, and the reality of inadequate hygiene infrastructure systems in many African cities, their work becomes more critical in real time in a city like Lagos, Nigeria where no local government has been certified open defecation free[1].
Our study sought to understand the operational role of frontline sanitation workers (bio-fil toilet installers, public toilet operators, and dislodgement plant workers) in ensuring sustainable fecal waste management in Lagos, Nigeria’s largest city. We spoke with 40 sanitation workers across the city and officials of the regulatory agencies in the course of the study.
The stigma of being a sanitation worker
Lagos sanitation workers are informal workers who were compelled to join the work in the absence of other employment options, and so, lack the social and economic opportunities necessary for a decent livelihood.
The typical sanitation worker is male, aged between 28 to 40 years, and had completed secondary education. Many had been working in the sector for an average of seven years. Interestingly, we found them to have other artisanal skills such as bricklaying and carpentry, often combining low and infrequent wages in their artisanal trades with the added income from sanitation work which doesn’t require any form of training. We found three main categories of sanitation workers.
There are those employed as waste-water plant operators by the state government. These are the dislodgers, working mostly during the day to ensure free flow of sewage lines in public housing estates. This could mean manual extraction of the offending materials that block the lines with serious health risks.
Then there are the workers employed by septage dislodgers truck operators. They move with the trucks to evacuate sewage tanks in individual households, businesses and other places throughout the city. They would usually sleep in their trucks during the working week to reduce living costs. Many of them are itinerant migrant workers whose families live outside Lagos.
Women sanitation workers are more frequently found as public toilet cleaners or operators. They sweep, wash, and fetch water from surface wells when tap supply is interrupted. They also clean up the toilets immediately after customer use them. In some public toilets where there is more than one worker, they would work in shifts of the morning, afternoon, or daily shifts on alternate days.
Dislodgement plant workers and their trucks at Lekki, Lagos
In general, sanitation workers do not publicly acknowledge the sanitation work that they engage in, as they feel a deep sense of shame and will immediately leave should better opportunities arise.
‘Nobody knows about the nature of my work. I cannot tell my friends and family because it is dehumanizing. I just tell them that it is government work’, said a waste water plant operator who had been in the sector for twenty years.
‘Most people know me for my electrical works, that is what I tell them’, another remarked, relating how he uses his part-time artisan gig as a cover for his full-time job. In Lagos, many artisans do not get regular work and have to augment their income with manual labour activities.
Sanitation workers are also exposed to poor working conditions and very low wages. Public toilet workers usually work for an average of 12 to 13 hours daily, without protective gear thus at high risk of occupational hazards. Sometimes, the dislodgement plant workers have to manually extract sludge items blocking the waste pipes. The average monthly wage of a sanitation worker ranges between 20,000 to 50,000 naira (between $45 and $70). The jobs are also quite precarious as they are all temporary workers, with none of them connected to any workers union, pension funds, or registered for health insurance. As such, they often resort to out-of-pocket self-medication and some reported they would sooner go to work when sick to avoid being replaced.
There were cases of alcohol and even illicit drug addiction among peers. According to one of the dislodgement plant workers: ‘Most people start drinking gin after being exposed to odours and gases from this work. Some can't even eat without consuming alcohol first.’
They also face stigmatization from the public. According to a public toilet operator: ‘We are treated badly by customers and called bad name like Baba Toilet’.
One of the septage trunk operators lamented: ‘Some persons see it like it's not a job, so they feel like if you are doing it, it's because you've lost all hopes or something.’
All of these reduce the feeling of self-worth and accomplishment of sanitation workers as their activities are not seen as decent employment.
A Mobile Toilet Facility at Oshodi, Lagos
Supporting decent work in the Lagos Urban Sanitation system
Sanitation workers do not work in decent, safe and fulfilling environments. They deserve to be recognized as essential workers in a system where there is still a heavy reliance on manual processes for waste dislodgment and the use of public toilets to address environmental safety.
One of the reasons for the current unrecognition of sanitation workers is that waste-water management itself is accorded minimal recognition in both research and policy circles in Lagos and other African countries. This implies there is weak institutional structure to support the activities of waste workers. The Lagos State Wastewater Management Office (LASWAMO) oversees the activities of dislodgement truck and waste water management plants operators, focusing mostly on setting standards for the equipment and hard infrastructure, and engaging with entrepreneurs within the sector.
The experiences related by sanitation workers provide a compelling reason to introduce decent work considerations for these workers on the lower waste value chain. This includes permanent positions for those who are casualised, connection to state health insurance schemes and intentional oversight of the working conditions of all categories of sanitation workers, possibly reducing risks to health, livelihood and sanity. Through these, society can become more aware and more appreciative of the roles of these front-line workers in a system that is critical to urban health, yet generally overlooked.
Acknowledgement
The authors gratefully acknowledge the funding support of the Initiatives for Sanitation Workers in 2022 – 2023 for the ‘Hidden World of Lagos Sanitation Workers’ project. To read the detailed report, click here.
The blog authors are:
Basirat Oyalowo is a Senior Lecturer in Real Estate at Oxford Brookes University. Previously, she was Research Manager at Centre for Housing and Sustainable Development, University of Lagos (email: boyalowo@brookes.ac.uk)
Taibat Lawanson is Professor of Urban Management and Governance and Co-Director of Centre for Housing and Sustainable Development, University of Lagos, Nigeria (tlawanson@unilag.edu.ng)
Anthony Akpan is founder and president of the Lagos based NGO Pan African Vision for the Environment (ajakpan@yahoo.com)