Nigeria: Water has Enemies

Tunde Akande

Many years ago, late Nigerian and world renowned Afrobeat maestro, Fela Anikulapo, sang "water no get enemy" which he rendered both in his native Yoruba language and Nigeria's brand of corrupt English, the pidgin. In Fela's view, water has no enemy because no man or woman can avoid water. If you are not drinking it, you are bathing with it. If you are not bathing with it, you are doing your cooking with it. And if you are not cooking with it, you are bathing your baby especially, for the poor in Nigeria, where when your baby develops malaria the symptom of which is temperature rise detected by the 'hand thermometer' of the mother as she feels the baby's forehead for the high temperature with her hand, eventually it is water that she turns to to dab the baby's body. Hospitals are not in her imagination because she does not have the money to access the hospitals. Her leaders have cheated her, they have led her to the sharp bend of the forest and have abandoned her there, they have given her many promises but they have left her to the mercy of water and local herbs.

But now, water appears to be gathering many enemies in Nigeria. In the recent weeks and possibly it will continue for some months to come, water will be enemy of Nigerians killing them, destroying their crops and rendering them homeless. Again their leaders are betraying them leaving them to the torment of water. Water came in high volumes more than they can hope to drink, bath with, cook with, bath their babies with and is now an unwanted neighbor. In Lokoja, where Yahya Bello, is governor, water is ravaging the people and no help is in sight. Yahya Bello finds it convenient to fight business mogul, Aliko Dangote over ownership of Obajana Cement which Dangote bought in 1977 but which Yahya Bello and his legislature said was not properly sold. Interested observers say the underlying reason is the inability of the private company to grease the palms of Yahya Bello. They say there ought to be some kobo skimmed off every bag of cement produced which by Nigeria's unwritten sleaze system should be going to the private pocket of Yahya Bello but which is not going there.

Therefore, Yahya Bello concentrated on that urgent battle first because what concerns Ceaser shall first be served, the issue of water which is ravaging the people can wait a little. A few thousands killed can only mean a good reduction in population which, of course, has been surging out of control for some time; the surging of water is therefore good and cost-effective measure to curtail the surging population. Prayer answered. Water from the Lagdo dam in Cameroon was released so that the surging current will not damage the dam. Thus the operators of Lagdo dam released a high volume of water which in turn has ravaged many parts and it turns out to be an enemy of Nigerians. It bothered President Muhammadu Buhari less that Kogi State was inundated by flooding, which is just about one and a half hours drive away from Abuja and the presidential villa, Aso Rock. Buhari is safely ensconced inside a rocky fortress and the man on the ground in Kogi State, Yahya Bello was too busy looking for money to bother about some helpless people that water is ravaging. Buhari will not addrees the nation on the catastrophic flooding that has ravaged 31 states, and Governor Bello will not give up his percuniary war with Aliko Dangote, the cement mogul.

Amidst the battle between Yahya Bello and Dangote, the Kogi State House of Assembly, which issued a report declaring Dangote and Obajana Cement in the wrong, subsequently recommended its closure by force which was carried out by thugs called vigilantes, got razed by fire. It was Dangote that came to the rescue of Kogi by producing a firefighting vehicle to put out the fire because Kogi has not a single firefighting vehicle. In the midst of that battle, billionaire Dangote extended his 'long leg;' we call influence peddling in Nigeria because if you have money in Nigeria, your leg will be very long even if you are not tall. Dangote's visit and his 'long leg' woke up the residents of Aso Rock and consequently the National Economic Council ordered that Yahya Bello and Dangote should iron out their differences in the court. But that is what Yahya Bello should have done in the first place. Why didn't he do it? But he prefers to march to one of the biggest cement factories in the world located in his state, the biggest private employer of labour in the state, the biggest contributor to taxes in the state and in Nigeria and put it under lock and key. Dangote may contribute humongous taxes to the state but the contribution to the governor's private pocket is more important and that cannot be ironed out in the court.

It will be interesting to see how the courts will handle the case. I can almost hear some judges jostling to hear the matter since Dangote will be going with a deep pocket. Before the elections tribunals will be sitting at the end of the February elections next year, the Dangote/ Kogi tango will be a good source of private revenue for the judge or judges comparable only to the election tribunals. We will wait hoping that a settlement out of court will be announced. Dangote may prefer to do one or two things for Yahya Bello in the spirit of conflict resolution in Nigeria's peculiar way. Yahya Bello's tenure is ending in May and whatever is obtained from that negotiation may be a good take-home pay. Meanwhile, conducive business environment would have suffered a big blow and water now the enemy of the people of Kogi would have killed more.

Meanwhile, water has also become the enemy of the people of Bayelsa who have been cut off from the rest of the country, the people of Anambra state who now need canoes to move around. Anambra people inspite of the war declared on them by water have some joy: the sit at home foisted on them by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) secessionist agitators will stop for some time. While IPOB has guns, they do not have canoes and Anambra will rest since the lawyers of Nnamdi Kanu, the head of Biafran agitators, are piling political pressure on President Muhammadu Buhari to release him. Though the Buhari administration through his Attorney General, Abubakar Malami has refused to obey the Court of Appeal that discharged Nnamdi Kanu. Nigerians are learning English, they have opportunity to learn the difference between discharge and acquit. The attorney general said discharge does not mean aquit. I think the lawyers and the judges have to acknowledge that blood is thicker than water and that a president, especially if he comes in the guise of Muhammadu Buhari cannot be controlled by any court. To hell with the doctine of separation of powers or the rule of law. Buhari is an ex-general and he rules. Water is ravaging furiously in Adamawa too where a dam, Dasin Hausa that ought to have been built to stop the menace of water from Lagdo dam in Cameroon was allegedly not built. If Buahri would not talk to Nigerians, after all it is not more that 600 persons that have died, a figure which is not enough to catch the attention of a busy president who had to fly to Korea to attend to an unknown business, his Minister of Water Resources, Suleiman Adamu has spoken denying that there was ever an agreement between Cameroon and Nigeria to make Nigeria responsible to its citizens by building the Dasin Hausa dam which will curtail the water surge to Nigeria anytime water from the Lagdo dam is released. The minister reportedly blamed God for the water problem. It was water given to Nigeria as a blessing that became a curse. But he didn't say that somebody slept on duty.

Water is also ravaging parts of Lagos for another reason. Also, nearby Oyan dam, Ogun State has been released and water is causing havoc in Lagos, becoming the enemy of people who had been friendly with it. Lagos government is asking everybody to evacuate their houses in some marked areas. We don't know where those people will evacuate to in a state where it costs almost a million to rent a room apartment with private toilet and bathroom. Where water is not causing destruction, oil is the enemy. Oil is the mainstay of Nigerian economy. It determines everything. It is the wealth that is stolen in Nigeria. It is the reason Nigeria though it calls itself a federation is effectively a unitary state. It is the reason Nigeria will not decentralize so each unit can be effectively managed. It is the reason for concentration of power in the central government. It is the source of the huge power of Buhari, the reason for complacency in the country. It is the reason for a threatening civil war. The last civil war of 1967- 1970 was partly fought because of this oil. It is the reason every major ethnicity want to have a grip on the central government. It is the reason the president is the minister of petroleum resources.

Now culprits who are suspected to be members of either the corporation managing the oil or some ranking politicians embeded at the seat of power in Abuja have been stealing the oil. They stole so much oil that the government is not able to meet its quota of supply and therefore unable to fund its budget. A private security firm headed by Government Ekpemupolo aka Tompolo, a former leader of the Movement for Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) has detected many siphoning points that have been mind boggling. Nigeria has had to borrow so much from China that China got tired of lending money to the nation. Buhari again has not addressed the nation on the massive oil thefts. And people are saying he has not addressed the nation and may not because some of those who stole that oil may be close to the corridors of power.

Tunde Akande is both a journalist and pastor. He earned a Master's degree in Mass Communication from the University of Lagos.