A dominant Nigerian problem is the diffident attitude by the authorities to issues of critical concern to the progress and sustenance of the citizenry. Hence, the citizens, especially the unremarkable people, have over the years constantly paid for leadership ineffectuality and deficiency in very huge magnitude.
An example is the recurring huge fatalities and massive devastation wreaked by yearly flooding across the country. Despite public commotion over the unnecessary occurrences leading to the disaster and exacerbate the situation, governments at all levels have often either exhibited a do-nothing attitude or paid outright lip service to the threats and advice from experts and professional bodies. Thus, the gamut of the loss of lives and properties to floods remains high, with the concomitant ripple effects on the socio-economic life of the country.
In May this year, the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) issued an alert that at least 102 local government areas in 28 states in the country were at risk of copious flooding. Similarly, in March 2012, 32 out of the 36 states were affected by flooding, in which more than 360 people were killed and almost two million displaced.
Then in 2016, more than 92,000 were displaced as flood wreaked havoc across the country. In 2017, the figure almost tripled as an estimated 250,000 Nigerians were sacked from their homes. Described as phenomenal, the 2012 flood reportedly impacted more than seven million people, with over 2.3 million persons displaced and 363 persons killed. The flood devastated about 597,476 houses in 34 states, with estimated damage and loss put at N2.6 trillion.
A similar disastrous episode observed in 2018 left in its wake pains, sorrow and wailing. It involved 2,321,592 people, killed 199 and displaced 722,741 persons. It equally destroyed over 100,000 houses. The catastrophe inflicted on the citizens by flood in 2019 was no least unbearable, as more than 130,934 people were affected, with 48,114 persons displaced and 126 people killed, just as 29,356 houses were wrecked.
An earlier admonitory by the NIHSA that the current flood level which it put at 7.02m sighted at Niamey, Niger Republic, posed a precarious threat to the country, seems to be a prediction that holds true with the states it named to be at greater risk already experiencing a hard time. The states are Kebbi, Jigawa, Kano, Sokoto, Niger, Kwara, Kogi, Anambra, Edo, Delta, Rivers and Bayelsa.
For example, reports on severe flooding this year showed that in Jigawa State, which witnessed the worst flooding in 34 years, at least 50,000 houses were destroyed in 17 out of the 27 local government areas in the state, with more than 100,000 hectares of rice farmland washed away. A total of 40 people lost their lives. In Kano, the worst-hit area was Danbatta, where around 7,000 houses were destroyed and four deaths were recorded. The death toll in Kebbi and Sokoto States were six and 15 respectively.
Despite early warnings each year, there is skimpy interest by the government at all levels to put resources where they are urgently needed. Rather, the government prefers to buy mattresses and other sundry items, enrich a few contractors and political sycophants rather than put money in research efforts that can yield results needed to prevent the flood from occurring in the first place.
The most immediate effect of this problem is that it might compound the already bad issue of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). That is already happening. In the areas most affected, suffering, hunger and diseases of epidemic proportions are already in waiting. In our view, and considering what is already on the ground in IDPs’ camps scattered across the country, this will be one headache too many.
Sadly, states often adopt cosmetic measures such as clearing drainages amid rainfalls instead of taking pre-season, concrete, enduring and far-reaching actions to prevent flooding. It is inexplicable and depressing that increasingly the authorities are finding it difficult to think out of the box and proffer enduring solutions to flooding, which has made death so cheap for the common people.
Rivers State in particular is always found on the list of states to be flooded annually yet the government has not done more than the provision of relief materials. Unfortunately, several communities in the state were submerged in the water this year with very little help for the victims. Thus, we urge the state government in its usual charismatic manner to take the bull by the horn and be more proactive in proffering a lasting solution to perenial flooding in the State.
A state emergency response agency should be established to cater for disaster victims and end the dependence on the Federal Government for assistance, that never really comes.
We similarly urge local governments in the state to set up structures for assisting flood casualties since federal agencies only intervene at a stage of the flooding which may be too late. We suggest that both the local government councils and the state government jointly mitigate flooding at the preliminary stages to avoid colossal disaster.
Residents can also assist the government to prevent flooding of urban areas by desisting from building on water channels, avoid dumping of refuse in the drains and clear their drainages to accommodate volumes of water after each rainfall. The Sole Administrator of the Rivers State Waste Management Agency (RIWAMA), Bro Felix Obuah, has so much to do in this regard.
To call on the international community and donor agencies for aid each year flooding occurs may appear an attractive way out, but whatever comes from those sources will remain what they are meant to be – palliatives. The ultimate solution, therefore, is for the Nigerian authorities to do what they necessarily and urgently have to do to check this perennial disaster that is becoming a stigma because of the primitive approach to managing it.