The weirdness of his jubilation was understandable, as he jumped and ran, to the amaze-ment of the Lagos State public officials who had come to inaugurate the water project.

Master Lekan  Aribisala is one of the youth living in the rural Kembiri community of Okokomaiko in Ojo Local Government Area of the state. The public water scheme had excited him so much that he had to climb the wall to see the tap running.

The water scheme was one of the 500 rural projects executed by the state government in the last two years, and for Aribisala, it was a miracle seeing his stress of getting potable water for the family gradually fading away.

He was one of the hundreds of youths that must go faraway to fetch water before going to school every morning.  There were just two houses with bore holes in the community, where residents queued daily to get potable water.

At times, the two houses refuse to open the taps, making the residents to seek solace in the neighbouring communities with one farther away.

Aribisala and some other young children would have to trek long distances to fetch water for their parents to bath and drink before going to school. “There is no day I don’t get late to school. I have been nicknamed a perpetual latecomer because I have to fetch water every morning,” he said.

He told the Nigerian Tribune that though he was not the only boy that fetched water for his parents, but the volume of water he fetched was more than what most of his peers fetched. “I fill a drum of water everyday because we are a large family,” he said.

For Miss Faith Adepoju, lack of potable water in Kembiri community is like a curse. “We suffer to get potable water. This is a community of poor people. Almost all the houses here do not have well or boreholes. At times, we buy sachet water to bath if the two houses that have boreholes refuse to pump water for us,” she stated.

According to her, a bucket of water is sold for N20, and it took a lot of stress to even get it because of the crowd. She explained that it was always strenuous to get a cup of water whenever there was blackout in the community.

“This is a regular occurrence. The community seldom gets electricity supply. But the borehole operators pump water with the aid of electricity generators and sell it at higher rate to the residents,” she said.

However, fortune smiled on the community last week, when the state Ministry of Rural Development inaugurated a water scheme amidst jubilation.  The scheme is one of the 117 water projects for the rural communities in the state. With each one put at N2.8 million, the state government would have spent about N327 million on rural water scheme. Though investigation revealed that the number was far lower than the population of the rural dwellers, the Commissioner for Rural Development, Prince Lanre Balogun, believed that the scheme could provide a bit of respite for the people in the rural areas.

He told the Nigerian Tribune that the scheme was a continuous process and that with time, every community would get water in abundance.

As he put it, “This is a government with plan. We have mapped out our strategy on how to provide potable water for every community. We have met with leaders of all the Community Development Associations to know what their priorities are. Some told the government that they needed roads first; some requested for electricity; some want water; some, hospitals. We have taken all of these into consideration and have been doing it.”

Balogun noted that the government could not do all that the communities required because of paucity of fund, adding that the ministry would do its best to give the little it could for the yearning rural population.

He explained, “The whole budget of Lagos State, which is put at N430 billion, is not even sufficient for the development of the rural areas alone. However, the government has made it a mandate that the development of rural areas will go side by side with the urban development. No area will be neglected.”

Balogun spoke extensively on all the rural projects, which include establishment of neighbourhood security watch posts; Agricultural project in community schools; rural electrification and road construction.

Perhaps because of the government’s policy, Balogun refused to mention how much it had cost the ministry to provide the 500 infrastructural facilities for the rural areas, he only said that each of the water schemes cost between N1.5 and N1.8 million depending on the quality.

On maintenance, the commissioner said that it fell within the purview of the CDAs, who now have the authority to collect maintenance levy from residents.

According to him, the law that created the community associations gives room for levy collection for security and maintenance of the various facilities in the rural areas.

“They can collect some money to fuel the generators when there is no electricity to power the water. We have professionals who assist in monitoring the workings of the various facilities that government has put in the rural areas. We organise seminars for the residents to let them know that the facilities belong to them and that they should take care of it like their own properties,” he said.

It must be noted that the rural water scheme is different from the 15 micro water works that the state government recently installed within the core metropolis. This, according to the state governor, Mr. Babatunde Fashola (SAN), is expected to provide 30 million gallons of water each day.

As at the time of filing this report, eight of the 15 water works have been inaugurated and handed over to the various communities within urban Lagos and 117 water schemes for the rural areas.

Comments (1)

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my tears...
written by pedro, August 26, 2010

I shed tears(though this time tears of joy) when I read articles like these where my african brothers jubilate and praise those in power as if they are doing them a favour. In fact it is not a favour in anyway,rather it is a duty/ an obligation on their part to do so.They supposed to be servants and not masters to the people.That's more reason that makes it highly necessary for people to vote in public officers on merit and not follow blindly those people corruptly selected who do not see why they should represent the people.
May God bless all of you in power who think of the poor masses!

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