By Ojo Sola Olusegun
Kaduna
Emerging communities in Kaduna and other towns and their suburbs would soon be linked with potable water in response to residents’ yearning and to ameliorate their sufferings, the Kaduna state Commissioner for Water Resources, Ado Dogo Audu, has said.
Ado said the state government was set to double its efforts to make water available to most residents of the state, urging the consumers in the state to pay their water bills promptly to enable them to provide better services.
Speaking during facility and inspection tour of water facilities in Saminaka, Lere and Binin Gwari local government areas, the commissioner said plans were almost concluded to include the emerging communities into ongoing water reforms by the state government.
Addressing the people, the commissioner warned them against using the pipe borne water for farming activities, saying that it was one of major setback the ministry was facing to supply water to the area in the face of challenges that included obsolete equipment, inadequate power supply amongst others. He said: “The state government is doing everything possible to make water available for its teeming residents which you can see for yourself. Apart from water dams, motorised boreholes and solar water supply, we are trying to increase the numbers of hand-held borehole so that everybody can have access to good water. We only urge our people to exercise patience as dividends of democracy will reach nooks and crannies of the state.
“We also want the people to protect the facilities installed in their community especially now that the government is putting maintenance mechanism in place for the continuous water availability.” Responding, the Chief of Saminaka, Alhaji Musa Muhammed Sani, appealed to the state government to provide alternative land for the people to undertake human activities such as farming, cattle fattening and others. He argued that people had not been paying their water bills because water has not been running in recent times, adding that four out of six pumps installed few years ago were not functional.
He, however, appealed to the state government to intensify efforts to make water available to the people of the state, “good water would reduce disease and in turn reduce hospital bills.”