In Ekiti State, it’s been raining cats, dogs and bridges. Twice, between August 28 and September 30, 2019, two heavy rainfall in Ado Ekiti, the capital, claimed human lives and property worth millions of naira, while many residents were displaced.
Where rainfall was expected to be joy, it has become a nightmare as many vital link bridges in the capital city have been collapsing as the rains raged.
Hard hit is the Ureje bridge, which leads to the Federal Polytechnic, Ado-Ekiti, and the Afe Babalola University (ABUAD), as well as to the residential areas along the Ijan-Ekiti road.
Students, traders, farmers and residents were shocked when the Ureje bridge began to gradually fall apart and finally divided into two after the September 30 rain because of the heavy, ceaseless volume of water that slashed it. At least, three cars fell off the over 100 year-old bridge before it finally collapsed.
Another affected bridge is the Elemi River one, located along the Ekiti State University and close to the Ayemi garage. Both sides of the bridge, also an old one long begging for government attention, have been washed away by flood.
Under threat of collapse on the Falegan-Ilawe road is the busy Adere river bridge, which links many communities.
Legal luminary and founder of ABUAD, Chief Afe Babalola, attributed the cause of the collapse of the Ureje bridge to its “total neglect by the federal and Ekiti State governments.”
Babalola expressed sadness on the death of a man washed away by the river after the bridge collapsed following the heavy downpour on September 30.
The senior advocate disclosed he had been maintaining the Ureje bridge for the past nine years. “This road from Ado-Ekiti to Ijan to Ode to Ikare to Lokoja was built over 100 years ago, before I was born. The road from Ado-Ekiti to Akure is one of the worst roads in the country,” he said.
The Governor of Ekiti State, Dr Kayode Fayemi, after his visit to the Ureje bridge and other areas affected by flood, promised that the state government would urgently address the Ureje bridge crisis, in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing.
Fayemi noted that the bridge was too small to contain the high flow of water that attended the heavy downpour.
He said his administration had already emplaced some remedial measures to ensure that flood no longer causes further havoc in the state.
At a stakeholders meeting on disaster management on flooding, participants called on the state government to muster the political will to demolish all houses built on waterways to avoid flooding and its attendant huge losses.
The Head, National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), Ekiti Operations Office, Mr Afolayan Olusegun, warned that the rainy season would come with associated flood incidents in the state’s various communities and certain measures must be taken to prevent and mitigate flood disasters.
“Government needs to put more efforts to dredge the various rivers affected by the flood to accommodate more water so that the rivers are not overwhelmed, and to save the people from hardship every time rain is falling,” Olusegun said.
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