By Dada Ahmed.
The emergency meeting of the Nigeria Union Journalists, NUJ, Kogi State Council which took place at the NUJ Press Centre, Lokoja on May 11,2023 has come and gone, but without reflecting on the ongoing scarcity of water in Lokoja.
Though as the name connotes, it was originally meant for the leadership of the council to brief and reiterate the recent changes in the constitution of the union to members and to elicit their reaction.
Responding, members have no problem with the changes as they agreed to comply with its principle to move the union forward.
However,as the mirror of the society,they did not shy away from reflecting on the scarcity of potable water taking sour effects on the social and economic life of the people in Lokoja, capital of the Confluence Kogi State.
They, therefore, sent passionate appeal to the state government to rectify the problem which has been on since October 2022, prompted by the flooding of that year.
The importance of the appeal, especially coming from members of the fourth estate of the realm, who are experts in information management, geared towards bringing the feeling of the people to the door step of government and informing the people about governnent programmes and policies, is not far fetched.
This is because, unarguably, water represents life within the context of philosophical definition of human existence.
Water touches all ramifications of human existence and therefore, man finds it difficult to cope with life, any moment he finds it difficult to access this precious commodity to carry out his domestic as well as commercial or social activities.
Therefore, it stands to reason that, absence of potable water in any human settlement is to say the least, highly unacceptable by all known standard.
Health experts have argued, over the years that any community where potable water is lacking, residents of community are prone to many health hazards as they are exposed to water borne diseases, besides unpatatable social and economic consequences.
Merriam-webster dictionary,defines water as the liquid that descends from the clouds as rain, forms streams, lakes, and seas."
It also described water as a major constituent of all living matter,pure, odorless, tasteless, very slightly compressible liquid, oxide of hydrogen H2O which appears bluish in thick layers, freezes at 0° C and boils at 100° C."
Water, it further explains,"has a maximum density at 4° C and a high specific heat,feebly ionized to hydrogen and hydroxyl ions, and is a poor conductor of electricity and a good solvent."
All this goes to underscore the importance of water to man in making life meaningful for him to a hygenic living.
Ordinarily, residents of Lokoja, capital of the Confluence Kogi State should have no cause to lack availability of potable water, after all, Lokoja which prides itself as the Confluence city harbours River and Benue where the two rivers of different origin flow as one to other bodies of water to other parts of the world.
However, this is far from the reality in Lokoja as most parts of the state capital have being without potable water for the past seven months.
The genesis of the travail of most people of Lokoja in accessing drinkable water stems from the most devasitating effect of October 2022 flood, the first of its kind in the 32 history of kogi State in terms of human tragedy.
Besides rendering thousands of residents of the state homeless, coupled with other hurrible consequences, the flood also submerged the equipment of the Lokoja Greater Water works at Ganaja village that supply potable water to the state capital.
Since then, residents say they have been subjected to untold hardship,a development they noted forced them to depend on the rich neighbours who have either wells or boreholes for water to meet their cooking and washing.
Others say that in the absence of the benevolence of neighbours in bailing them out of scarcity of healthy water, they have resorted to lining up their jerricans at the old Lokoja water works to fetch water .
Yet, others revealed that they have been forced to use raw water from river Niger,or go after brooks, a natural body of water smaller than river which not fit for human consumption, not minding the health implications of their action.
Besides affecting the domestic affairs of the people negatively, the commercially-oriented ones said they are not finding life easy as well. According to them, a significant percentage of them, especially car wash operators using water from the Greater Lokoja Works for business have been temporarily suspend work pending the return of water..
In all this,the state government says it not unmindful of the sour effects of potable water on the people but assured that conscious efforts were on to rectify the problem.
Speaking with the Journalists on the issue, the Commissioner for Water Resources, Mr. AbdulMumin Danga, disclosed that work had reached 70 per cent completion in the repair of the water treatment plant at the Greater Lokoja Water Woks.
According to him, the Governor of the state, Alhaji Yahaya Bello has approved the proposal he sent to him for the purchase of new transformer to activate the water plant being repaired , adding that with the approval while serious efforts were on to purchase one.
He, therefore, appealed to members of the public to exercise patient with the state government,assuring them that very soon, potable water would return to various homes in the area.
While acknowledging the efforts of the state government in rectifying the problem, most residents in Lokoja called for accelerated action by various governnent functionaries charged with the responsibility of quickening the process of returning potable water to homes.
They called on the state government to leverage on the repair of the water treatment plant to extend the scope of supply of potable water to areas hitherto not enjoying such dividend of democracy.
The areas include Workers' village located at General Hassan Usman Katsina road and Otokiti housing estate, Zango daji, Crusher and Felele, a strategic satellite of the state capital among other settlements.
This, they argued, would make more people benefit from the essence of governnent the more.
According to them, since water is of strategic importance to the social, econimic and health of any society, it becomes, imperative,therefore, for them to access this precious commodity at ease.
A stitch in time, they stressed saves nine.
Dada Ahmed publishes The Reporters,an online publication.
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