Many residents watch the earth move, pulling down homes, cutting off roads and leaving them in despair. OKODILI NDIDI reports on the ravages of erosion in Imo State
It sometimes looks like a horror movie in slow motion. Right before their eyes, roads and farmlands are being washed away. Some communities are being cut off, houses buried in red earth. In some places, residents of threatened homes peer down in horror on the huge gulf created by that seven-letter word: erosion.
Most communities in Imo State are coping rather badly with the phenomenon. Displaced residents have been suking, unsure when the terror will end.
Their pain has been compounded by the increasing rainfall that has resulted in flooding and the creation of gully erosion that has eaten away the already deplorable roads.
Worst hit, are the residents of Ihiagwa, Old Nekede and Umudibia.
Coincidentally, the affected communities all in Owerri West Local Government Area are hosts to two Federal institutions in the state, Federal University of Technology Owerri (FUTO) and the Federal Polytechnic, Nekede.
The Nekede-Ihiagwa Road, for instance, can best be described as a disaster waiting to happen as residents and motorists plying the road are exposed to great danger; the road may cave in anytime without warning.
This obvious risk has compelled staff and students of the tertiary institutions to abandon their cars at home and engage the services of commercial motorcyclists at exorbitant fares.
Hoodlums have also cashed in on this situation to torment residents and road users alike as they now lay ambush at these points where they pounce on their victims and dispossess them of their valuables.
Recently, a Reverend Father, who was also a lecturer at the Imo State Polytechnic, Umuagwo, was murdered at one of the erosion points by gunmen who laid ambush there. Some others have taken it upon themselves to mend the potholes and equally demand for money from the motorists.
Piqued by the development and the continued neglect of the roads by the relevant authorities, students of the two federal institutions are now threatening to embark on protest to draw attention of government to their plight.
The traditional ruler of Umudibia Autonomous community, Eze Godwin Merenini, appealed to government to come to the aid of the residents as economic and social activities have collapsed in the community as a result of the bad roads.
The obviously disturbed monarch, lamented that indigenes who go to Owerri, the State capital for their businesses now spend more than an hour going through Ihiagwa via Obinze instead of 20 minutes it normally takes from Nekede to Owerri.
Motorists and tricycle operators plying the road are equally counting their losses as they meander through the borough created by the erosion to take their passengers to their respective destinations.
At the old Nekede road, tricycle operators have to intermittently drop their passengers who will cross to the other section of the road on foot before they commence their journey.
Indigenes of the community complained that they now live in constant fear as the fast expanding erosion is endangering most houses along the road which they fear may cave in when the people are asleep in the night.
The residents disclosed that all the entreaties to the state government to come to their aid and tackle the menace had gone unheeded.
They appealed to both the state and Federal Government to urgently tackle the erosion, imploring that the road is the only link between the community and the state capital.
Also the residents in Ndegwu, Irete and Orogwe have resigned to fate as they watch helplessly while erosion wreck havoc on their roads, houses and farmlands. For instance, the only road leading to Ndegwu, a sleepy agrarian community has been totally submerged by flood. The residents wade through the waist deep water to take their children to school and ferry their farm produce to the market.
One of the residents, Mr. Stanley Uzoadu, observed that the road became worse after the contractor handling the critical link road which connects the three communities abandoned it after excavating the both sides of the road.
According to him, “we are exposed to serious danger crossing the water and the rate of water borne diseases have increased in the last two months. We are appealing to the state government to carry out a palliative maintenance on the road to avert the impending disaster”.
Public institutions like schools and markets are also not spared by the rampaging erosion. Several school buildings have been reportedly abandoned for fear of possible collapse as a result of the erosion.
A highly placed government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that the erosion menace became worse because the state have not been able to access the Ecological fund in the last four years due to politically motivated bottlenecks.
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