EJIWUNMI Enji Area 1, in Offa Local Government Area of Kwara state, is a fish farming community. The swampy community, adjacent Offa Secretariat Road, is fast becoming a shadow of itself. This followed incessant flooding, which residents said has continued to ravage their residential and business premises, forcing many to vacate their homes and abandon their businesses.

Alfa Azeez Kanisuru, is a fish farmer and one of the community leaders. He soon became emotional while speaking to this reporter in September. He narrated how he incurred a debt of about N10 million due to flooding about two years ago and is now unable to repay the loan he took from a Cooperative Society.

Two years ago, Kanisuru said the entire area was flooded and their fish ponds submerged. “Our fishes were swept away. Some of us who have high blood pressure fainted and landed in the hospital because of the huge loss. Personally, I had just gotten a loan of about N10 Million from a Cooperative to boost my fish farming, but alas! the fish ponds were submerged by flood,” he said.

He said the community went to Offa Local Government Secretariat to complain, and they were promised assistance of money and fingerlings, but were instead, offered fertilisers as support. “We rejected it because we are fish farmers. Of what benefit is fertiliser? What can help our situation is to fix this erosion control, expand it to contain the volume of water coming here and provide us with soft loans to run our businesses,” he insisted.

“Even on different occasions, officials of the State Government have visited this area on this problem. There was a time the Former Commissioner for Water Resources, Alhaji Femi Whyte Agbaje, visited here in 2021 with a promise to help us fix it, but nothing was done,” he said.

Like the fish farmer, Margaret Oni, a civil servant, who reside in the community, says her three–bedroom apartment often gets flooded during heavy rainfalls. The 56-year-old widow said though the community had made efforts to expand the drainage system in the area, it has not been of much help due to the volume of water that fills the area.

“All the houses here were flooded just last week. My children could not go to school for days,” she told our correspondent in September.

Both residents and other members of the community told this reporter that the flooding has continued to damage homes and businesses despite an erosion control project constructed by the Federal Government in 2019.

This investigation found that in the 2018 budget, the Federal Government made provisions for the construction of flood and erosion control structures along Enji River Offa (around Owode market area) worth N37,181,242 for the first phase. The allocation is under the Lower Niger River Basin Development Authority. The Federal Government also made another allocation of N20,436,683.40 for the same Enji River flood and erosion control along Secretariat Road in Offa, for its completion. Both projects were awarded to Barosit Interbiz Nigeria Limited.

According to the GovSpend portal, a payment of N21,138,855 was released on the March 1, 2019 by the Lower Niger River Basin Development Authority to Barosit Interbiz Nigeria Limited for the construction of flood and erosion control work along Enji River, Offa Kwara state. But when contacted, the Lower Niger River Basin Development Authority confirmed to this reporter that full payments have been made to the contractor, with a total sum of N57,617,925.78

However, a visit to the site of the project by this reporter confirmed that despite the release of funds and the construction work, residents say the drainage system constructed by the contractor was too narrow and has, therefore, not solved the problem of flooding.

This reporter gathered that when the contractor, Barosit Interbiz Nigeria Limited, started the construction of the drainage, residents of Ejiwunmi were full of hope that their flooding problem would be solved. However, their hopes were short–lived.

“It is just too narrow that the community need to create an alternative besides the one done by government. If you see its size by the roadside where we have the culvert, it is a bit wide but narrower as it gets inside,” Oni told this reporter in September.

Meanwhile, Razaq Ajeigbe, who owns a shop along the Enji River culvert, said the culvert contributed to solving the erosion problem the Secretariat Road was known for. “Before we had this culvert, when it rains here, everywhere used to be flooded. The road will be taken over by water, which causes serious traffic. But since they have done this culvert, it has become a thing of the past,” he said.

Oni, who accused the contractor of doing a substandard job, said some parts of the drainage are in bad shape, just two years after the project. She pointed at some parts of the drainage concrete which had been washed away and cut off.

“We cannot even see any traces of drainage along the river at some parts; it has been washed off and some parts submerge with sands. The community does an expansion for free flow of water,” she maintained.

Oni added that some of the landlords and fish farmers were forced to abandon their houses and trade due to the flood. “One of such landlords is a lawyer whose house is built on the bank of the river. He had to relocate his family, but if we have a deep-high and wider flood control in this area, it will solve our problem,” she said.