“See you at caca sport!” “, throw in the face two teenagers from the modern Lycée Victor-Amougou de Marcory, in Abidjan. There’s going to be a fight… “Caca sport” is the name the students have given to the small building housing eight disused latrines where they settle their accounts out of sight of adults. You get there after zigzagging across a huge dirt playground, soaked by the May rains. A place as unsanitary as it is undersized.
For lack of appropriate equipment, the 5,000 students of this public establishment defecate on the small adjacent plot of approximately 80 m2, covered with excrement, plastics and soiled paper. When asked since when the children of this “very popular” neighborhood no longer have access “to amenities”, Yves Koffi, education inspector in charge of school life, shrugs his shoulders. “These toilets were already rehabilitated a few years ago, but they ended up clogging again. The maintenance man got discouraged. He didn’t always see his salary coming. All of this is deplorable. »
The health situation of this high school in the economic capital is far from being an exception. In Côte d’Ivoire, some 50% of urban schools, all cycles combined, are not equipped with functional toilets and up to 65% in rural areas, according to cross-referenced figures from local associations, the government and international NGOs. According to UNICEF, 620 million children worldwide do not have access to basic health services in their schools. The Ivorian press regularly echoes this “dramatic” state of play.
Yet, thirty years ago, a National School Hygiene Day – March 3 – was instituted, but the infrastructure did not follow. Students are therefore asked to restrain themselves or relieve themselves as best they can where they can. The situation was “mentioned to the ministry and to the region”, laments Yves Koffi, listing the difficulties with which the public sector teaching body struggles to carry out its mission. Here the classes are between 70 and 100 students, he recalls. The office of the Minister of Education, Mariatou Koné, repeatedly approached by Le Monde, did not respond.
Health issues and sexual violence
If the impossibility of isolating oneself in a place of ease is only one problem among others, it is particularly acute for young girls. At Lycée Victor-Amougou, students in blue skirts, the uniform in force, complain loudly. They mimic the boys who harass them by sticking to their buttocks, explaining that they have to urinate standing up, legs apart to avoid getting dirty. Suiting the action to the word, they also describe the chronic infections that follow. To escape remarks and inappropriate looks, many prefer to go home, and do not always return to high school, especially when they have their period.
Beyond health problems and sexual violence, the lack of toilets keeps adolescent girls away from classrooms. While it is difficult to assess how many learning days are lost, this absenteeism has consequences on the exam success rate of girls, who are not yet on par with boys (44% of the workforce). In 2021, according to the latest figures from the Ivorian government, only 41.25% of secondary school girls obtained their BEPC and not even a third of high school girls (29.61%) obtained their baccalaureate.
“Gender inequalities are expressed at school and this toilet story is only one of the symptoms of a larger problem that affects the economic, social and cultural question of feminine hygiene”, analyzes Angèle Koué, who chairs the NGO Genre Parité Feminine Leadership (Gepalef), an association that has been crisscrossing Côte d’Ivoire for three years to collect field data and get things moving.
The role played by feminist organizations is essential. The high school and college students of Marcory will be able to say thank you to them next school year: it was the activists of Gouttes Rouges, specializing in the fight against menstrual poverty, who found the million CFA francs (1,500 euros) necessary for the renovation of the Victor-Amougou latrines with the French Development Agency (AFD) and Féministes en action, and plan to carry out another rehabilitation project in the Koumassi high school, in Abidjan, in August. The NGO ActuElles will take care of the toilets at the modern Lycée de Bonoua, in Grand-Bassam: “Ministries support us of course, but they never have enough money to act”, summarizes bluntly Salimatou Baldé, who chairs the organization.
Nine “boys” and nine “girls” waters
In Anono, another popular district of the Ivorian megalopolis, the 4,000 pupils of the primary school group have already found their way back to the cabinets thanks to the energy of Madia Bamba of the NGO Encor’Elles. It was at the British Embassy that she found a sympathetic ear and funds. The 34-year-old activist, very committed to citizen lobbying, proudly shows “before and after” photos.
Instead of a space saturated with excrement and wild grass, there are now nine “boys” and nine “girls” toilets, plus four reserved for teachers, all separated by cream and pistachio-colored walls inaugurated at the end of March. A small revolution for Hélène Brou, one of the six directors of this public school: “In the classes that were located next door, the smell was unbearable. Some teachers were literally sick of it. Since the renovation, we have been forced to close a passage that existed between the toilets and the vacant lot nearby, otherwise residents would also come to take advantage of the amenities. »
It was while chatting with shopping mothers in the Anono market, not far from the school, that Madia Bamba was alerted. The site visit convinced her to launch the Latrines solidaires program. “In order for these toilets to become everyone’s project and also everyone’s responsibility, we have sensitized and integrated the town hall, all the teaching staff and the neighborhood chieftaincy, testifies the activist. In the countryside, when I was a child, having access to toilets was not even considered a subject, let alone a right. This is progress, but we are still only at the beginning of change. »
Confuse around the large washbasin in the toilet. Little girls wash their hands while heckling with water after going to the toilets under the watchful eye of their mistress. “And scrub well!” “, she enjoins them. Schoolgirls in little black and white gingham dresses run away laughing. Same scene on the boys’ side, where we don’t bother to close the door between friends. And the soap? “He’s coming,” Hélène Brou hastens to reply.