The good people in the biblical time of Noah were saved from death and destruction of flood with the building of an ark. Should Nigeria do the same today as incessant rain over the weekend led to flooding which resulted in the destruction of millions of naira worth of properties and death in some parts of the country. This once again has exposed the poor urban planning of our cities.
The people residing in the affluent areas of Lekki, Victoria Island and Ikoyi areas of Lagos State were worst hit on Saturday, homes and their cars submerged under water. It got so sad that a man was kayaking on the popular Ahmadu Bello Way, Victoria Island, usually a busy business district.
In Niger State, it has been reported that the heavy downpour led to the death of 11 people. The death toll is expected to rise according to eyewitnesses account of the situation. Worst his is Suleja and part of Tafa local government areas.
The Director General of the Niger state Emergency Management Agency, NSEMA ,Alhaji Ibrahim Ahmed Inga, who confirmed the incident to journalists disclosed that the members of the agency’s search and rescue operation were at the sites of the disasters with other volunteers.
He stated that so far two of the bodies of those killed by the flood have been recovered but the search and rescue operation was still on to recover the remaining bodies while efforts are being made to attend to those injured and ameliorate the sufferings of those whose houses were submerged. “ As I am talking to you now the search and rescue operation is going on and now two bodies have been recovered, initially we thought it was eight people who lost their lives in Suleja but now it has increased to ten and we have another one from Tafa”.
Flooding, like all other natural disasters are not peculiar to Nigeria alone but the difference lies in the response time and what we are doing to ameliorate the damages and forestall future occurrences. Without mincing words, the blame for the flooding in Lagos can aptly be put at the door of the government. The state has been expanding without proper urban planning. This is a state surrounded by water, the same poor urban planning or planlessness that characterized the expansion of Lekki, Victoria Island and Ikoyi is currently taking place in areas like Badagry, Ikorodu and other parts of the states.. Successive governments in Lagos have been playing politics with the implementation of the building laws. They allow people to build in places meant to for canals, drainages. The indiscriminate building of structure is unabated and rampant in the state.
The state government issued a statement urging residents in affected areas to stay at home and for those living in lowlands to ‘move upland’
‘ “You are implored as much as possible to stay indoors unless it is essential to your safety and livelihood,” said Samuel Adejare, the city’s environment commissioner. Move upland to where? Government just like issuing statements without corresponding actions.
Lagos is a megacity of over 17 million residents and is one of the fastest growing cities in the world and a 2008 report warned that millions of people were at risk of losing their homes because of rising sea levels. The government must stop playing lip services to the provision of social infrastructure and the implementation of the law. Needless gridlocks everywhere because commercial buses refused to obey the law to drop and pict passengers at the bus stop, people parking where they are supposed not to park, driving against oncoming vehicles and the worst of all, the duping of refuse on the roads and in the drainages. It is the duty of the government to ensure the people comply with the law by enforcing it fairly and judiciously. Its high time the weight of the law is brought down on erring persons.
Nigeria is a signatory to the Paris Climate Agreement but ask our leaders what measures and policies are they putting in place to address the clear and present danger of climate change, what you will get is a litany of incomprehensible rant. We often sign international agreement without the intention to adhere to it. If the postulations of the researchers is anything to go by, excessive rain is as a result of climate change. And we are doing nothing about it.
Flooding cannot be eradicated 100 percent, it is a phenomenon that happens everywhere in the world, we only need to manage it better. On this same weekend, about 20 people died in Japan as a result of flooding. Flooding has taken place in major cities of the world such as Paris, New York, London, Miami, Berlin, Beijing and many more. The different is in the promptness of the rescue team, evacuation of those affected, insurance indemnity of damages, urban planning and strict implementation of the laws. We have to learn how to apply the law across the board- no preferential treatment for big men, politicians or uniform people. The situation where one man’s house was demolished for building on a drainage and another man’s house was left to stand for building on drainage will only spell doom.
Lastly, the Lagos State Government must do an environmental impact assessment of the dredging and sand filling going on in some parts of the state. Nigeria is projected to become third most populous nation in the world by 2050, bulk of that population will reside in Lagos. The time to start proper urban planning is now, building 1,000 arks will not solve the problem.
