By Ibraheem Solaudeen
When two days ago, the Kwara state governor, Alhaji Abdulrahman Abdulrazak announced that he has given instructions to officials of Water Ministry in Agba and Asa Dams to put up the issues affecting water supply, especially in the metropolis, for rectification; many thought it was the usual ‘talk, no action’ they were accustomed to.
When the governor himself took to Twitter to say that there is “no more big grammar about ‘reticulation’. No more empty talk. All I want to see is potable water getting delivered to our people within the next 100 days, starting with areas in the State capital,” people thought the governor was bluffing. But it’s now clear he meant every word!
While the mere mention of “reticulation” in the governor’s tweet was an obvious jibe at the last government which kept singing ‘reticulation’ all through without being able to solve the protracted water problems in the state; Governor Abdulrazaq’s style seemed to be working. The governor told officials of the state water corporation that he “wants water delivered within 100 days”, but water is back to homes within the State capital in less than 48 hours! Big kudos!
While the governor’s visit to the water corporation took place on Monday, 3rd June; by the evening of Wednesday, 5th June, there was a cheerful news that water supply has returned to some parts of the state capital.
With billions expended by successive administrations in the state to tackle the water challenge, with no visible result to justify such spendings; it can only be left to imagination the sort of relief the people must have felt with the unfolding achievement in the area of water supply by the Abdulrazaq government.
Although supporters of the immediate past governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed said the new governor was merely taking credit for already completed work since, according to them, water was only restored “to homes and areas already connected under the Ilorin Water Reticulation Scheme.” They also claimed that water only “temporarily stopped running because workers of the state water corporation embarked on strike to protest their multimillion naira cooperative arrears and also because the former government couldn’t provide the N10m monthly diesel cost for the water plants.”
Notwithstanding the excuses offered on behalf of the immediate past government, the truth remains that the Abdulfatah government had a choice of placating the workers of the corporation and returning them to work. But they didn’t do it. Moreover, there is always what is called the ‘low hanging fruit’ for every government to pluck and immediately begin to show people that it’s working. If Governor Abdulrazaq therefore plucked the ‘low hanging fruit’ visible to his government, which in any case was left on the tree by the preceding government, no one should begrudge him.
However, considering that we have seen situations that governors would claim to undertake water projects in the past, only to put water in tanks so people can see it on the day of commissioning and never again; we hope this latest joy concerning the return of water to Kwara won’t be short lived. We hope whatever solution we are seeing in the area of water supply would be permanent and not temporary or ad-hoc solution to grab the headlines.
By and large, It’s indeed a big kudos to His Excellency and we commend his early achievements in this regard.
PHOTOS:
The governor inspecting the water treatment plant in the corporation