Obohia: A Disaster Waiting To Happen! Residents Fear Outbreak Of Contagious Diseases
… Residents Fear Outbreak of Contagious Diseases
… Decry Government Neglect
By Lawrence Nwimo
Using Obohia to describe gullible life of Aba residents is the worst picture anyone could withstand. Residents of Obohia are not the happiest set of people every rainy season. To them, rainy season is what they would rather wish to extinct from the world. It is a season where the young and the old wear drenched feet having had dirty environment as their dwelling place and wallowed through slums and dirty water that liter the streets.
Obohia has no hiding place. The road is a mess, the adjoining streets in ruins and the residents are already foot soldiers that have learnt the art of maneuvering pool of dirts and dirty surroundings. Rain boot is their favourite footwear, the young and the old have their respective sizes, without which you are sure to identify with the nearest hospital for treatment of infections. Just a brief summary of life in Obohia.
If hygiene is a scale to measure the safety living of people occupying a particular area, then obuohia is nothing to write home about. It is a town known for its trepid outlook, slum-like streets and and bereft of any good hygiene and a true description of a town that has been enduring overtime.
Obohia in Aba connects to ASA road, Ngwa road and Ugwunagbo local government. It is one of the worst roads in Aba surrounded by residential areas that is no better than the road itself.
Once a place of nightmare for strangers, the road so damaged to the point that transporters are always skeptic of plying the route because of different depths and sizes of pits- like potholes that are not better than death traps. It was a constant nightmare to pedestrians and motorists alike. A mere sight of the road sends fear down the spines of transporters. As they pass, they grinned and groaned due to the difficulty of meandering through the erosion ravaged road.
From Number 1 Obohia to Nkwo Ngwa is always a nightmare to residents because the road is completely flooded leaving the residents at the mercy of epidemics as they wallow through gutters and slums to their different destinations. While tricyclists engage in endless battle with flood.
People living beyond Nkwo Ngwa down to Christo Park juction and St Peters Anglican Church area are forced to treck long distance to their respective homes because such areas are not considered motorable.
Residents Fears Outbreak of Contagious Diseases
Narrating an experience, Mr Chidoka, a petty trader along Lagos Street told our reporter a sympathetic experience of how residents of the area almost got drowned at the slightest of downpour. According to him, a woman survived by the wiskers when she inadvertently missed her track and fell inside pool of dirty water that has occupied large portions of the road. He said the pool where the woman fell into had stayed for months because there was no drainage. He said that the lady got herself thoroughly soaked and gulped heavily from the pool of infected water with gullible stench down her intestine.
He said further that “as the woman was being washed of the stenchy mess that littered her body, she looked sad and helpless with resentment written all over but who knows how much disease she has taken in? Would she head to nearby clinic to get the necessary medication, does she have the money? only God knows! How about the others who have little or nothing to get healthy treatments after such experience.”
A resident of Imoka Street by Nkwo Ngwa who refused his name on print told our reporter that they live in steady fear of contacting diseases owing to dirty environment. He said that the residents are exposed to hazardous diseases be it rainy season or dry season.
“We are suffering here, the whole environment is very dirty and in total mess. There is no strategic plan for sitting of buildings in the town and that is why the town is water logged. Any day that it rained, our compounds are flooded by water and such water stays for weeks before machines are hired to pump such now dirty water out. To hire machine is always a problem because most of us living here are tenants and it is extremely difficult to contribute money to pump out such waters. That is why it takes time to clear such water and sometimes another rain will fall on it again making it Herculean tasks.
“During rainy season, we dare not wear shoe or fancy footware to our shops because we are always afraid of the dirty waters that come with it. Once there is downpour, we would have to pull off and walk on bare foot thereby exposing ourselves to epidemics. We are prone to diseases from dirty water such as mosquitoes, earthworms, centipedes and the likes. Once our legs start scratching us, we know we have contacted one.”
In Corroboration, an IMO state born transporter who lives around omuma road said ” If you see where we live, you will pity us. Omuma has no road. Sometimes when driving we get to a point where we have to turn back and search for road because the road is blocked. Strangers cannot visit us because there is no road. Aba is so dirty to the extent that if you are coming from Anambra through Okigwe, once you enter Aba, you will feel bad because the whole environment is terrible. Your mind will totally change.”
“People stay in slums and very dirty environment to sell food and food items . Go to Nkwo Ngwa in Obohia, there you will see how vegetables meant for consumption are kept on bare ground absorbing crude-like dirts on the busy road. Go to cemetary by rail there you will see how people sell food item in sorry environment. The worst case is that people defecate inside cellophanes and throw it on the same area where such human consumable goods are kept. Some of these faeces are ferried by rampaging floods into various households.
“I have lived in Aba for five years . Aba has been a swampy environment that we hardly know when it is rainy season or dry season. The life here has mastered us. If at all there is remedy it should be total overhauling of the town in terms of house plan because abuse of plan is the major problem of Aba.
“There is no drainage system in Obohia and other ruined part of the town starting from Pitiable Ngwa road, Obohia and even some part of omuma road has been blocked totally. Water from Ngwa road, Ohazu and others barricades Obohia and still Obohia has no gutter.”
Priest cries out to God over sorry state of Ohanku road
Ohanku road used to be one of the busiest roads in the old Aba. The road, turned pond, has been long abandoned by the Abia state government prompting a priest to take a drastic prophetical move.
The priest, Rev’d Acha David Okechukwu, a serving Methodist Priest in charge of umuogele circuit, Diocese of Aba East penultimate month, called on the God of Elijah to intervene on the lingered poor state of Aba roads.
The road until recently, used to be one of the busiest roads in Aba, Enyimba city, the economic hub of the Eastern heartland. It connects to many villages, cities and towns including Ngwa road, Iheorji, Mkpumkpu evule, Ama-nwadi-Ala to owerri-Aba, Ugwunagbo, Ukwa east and west, azumiri, Ndoki, Asa, connecting Akwaibom and Rivers states.
This area has produced many prominent men and women including the former minister for labour and productivity during Goodluck Ebele Jonathan administration Chief Emeka Nwogu.
But this all important road has remained impassable under many administrations in Abia State. The priest according to him received Divine instructions from God with his priestly robe to walk through the road from one end to another even in the moulky water for divine intervention.
Blames Government
Mr. Jude Urakwe who said he has lived for almost a decade in Aba said that present and past administrations should be held responsible for the underdevelopment of Aba. According to him, instead of Aba to get better due to huge economic gain from the popular markets it harbours, it kept going down into hopeless city.
“Government is not doing anything to help people of Obohia. If people talk, they will start demolishing houses and businesses as if they want to work on the roads. What annoys me about the government of the state is that ones they demolish people’s houses, they don’t compensate house owners and that is why the residents resist demolitions of buildings. Now, look at buildings around Port Harcourt road that was demolished for a long time because of the road, still nothing has been done on the road. All those people living around that Port Harcourt road whose buildings were demolished have up till now received no form of compensation with the road not done. That single demolition at that time sent most people to their villages because of their inability to pay house rent or build another house.”
“Government has been awarding contracts on the road but it is never carried out. During the Obasanjo regime, the Port Harcourt road was awarded for two consecutive times that was under Orji Uzor Kalu. Now they carried the same case of PH road to him again which made him ask “How many Port Harcourt roads are in Aba?”
Another resident named Innocent said ” I blame the town planners because the houses built in Aba have no adequate town planning. There is no proper drainage system giving way for water to form ponds every here and there, it becomes a threat to our health. Had it been there is a proper channel for waters in the area, once their is downpour, it will move into gutters. There is no gutters in Obohia but there is big gutter around waterside area where flood could be channeled to or even school road.
“If you go to Ajah road, once the weather becomes cloudy, you see residents scamper for buckets in readiness to scoop flood that besieged or run into their houses. Most houses there have been dilapidating because there is no upgrade.Some houses have gone underground living the occupants at the mercy of flood.”
Ngwa Road Abandoned
A shop owner along Ngwa road named obinna told our reporter that no major work has been carried out on the beleaguered Ngwa road by successive governments. According to him, the prayers of Ngwa people was answered and all hopes were raised when Okezie Ikpeazu was elected into power few years ago. At least, attention will be turned to Aba and its many developmental challenges including turning around the fortunes of the roads in the town.
” According to him, the road got damaged since TA Orji’s administration and nothing has been done. If you look at it now you will notice that it has been long the road was abandoned. The road has been totally cut off and and is quickly turning into lake if care is not taken. No government has done any significant thing about the road. We are not happy with the man we had thought will be our saviour. He has so far done nothing to prove to we his native people that he is the savior we voted for.”
“Ngwa road is the only road Ngwa people have but it is now impassable to both motorists and pedestrians alike. Ngwa road leading to Ahia Ohuru (New Market) has decayed with vast majority of it turned pond with tick bushes surrounding it.”
World Bank Intervention
Months preceding June, 2020, it started like rumors that the Abia state government with the help of World Bank has mapped out plans to construct the beleaguered road. Jubilation and huge expectations drew lines in the faces of the residents of the area. Early June, the residents woke to see assemblage of tractors for commencement of work which later held the residents by the neck as it was the only road for transporters to get to Nkwo Ngwa and beyond.
The expectation of the residents was barely met as the road rehabilitators did pour heaps of granites and stones to fill up pits created by the rampaging floods in the ever-busy obuohia road. By-standers and residents felt relieved as the road was finally remembered after years of neglect and abandonment.
Barely months after, it was observed that the palliative work carried out on the road after weeks of constant downpour has returned to its state with heavy pot holes settling quikely at various locations.
It was later learnt that the palliative work carried out on the road was meant to fix Boro pit that has been an endless nightmare to residents of Obohia. “They want to take Obohia gutter to Boropit then dreadge a tunnel that will link with orji Kalu bridge. That is why they are doing the palliative to allow them move their trucks to that place. If they complete the task, it will help reduce water in Obohia as most of the flood water will be channeled to waterside. It is not a government project but world bank project,” a resident said.
