Help, erosion swallowing up our ancestral homes in Oko

A visit to the community will clearly convince you that some people live on the verge of precipice; great danger to their lives and like a time bomb, might be swallowed up without notice. What a pathetic sight when this reporter visited the disturbing erosion sites which has no doubt, eaten deep into the topography, exposing Ezioko village in Oko town of Orumba North Local Government Area, Anambra State. Oko is the home town of former vice-President Alex Ekwueme. But, his people live in penury, unknown of what would happen next. Soil erosion is eating deep on their land, encroaching gradually the little piece of land belonging to the community, and already, several build¬ing have caved into the devastating and steadily encroaching erosion menace.
Not that the issue of Aguata and Orumba North erosion sites are new, but the level of devastation to the com¬munities around the area up to Awka, the Anambra State capital, is terrible and begs for serious attention. Several efforts in the past, have not helped matters and at the time of filing this report, there is the strong conviction that the home-stead of Dr. Ekwueme, where his senior brother, Igwe (Prof.) Laz Ekwueme, the traditional ruler of Oko built his palace, could cave into the erosion sprawling nerve-raking gully, which is just few meters away from Prof. Ekwueme’s Ezioko palace.
Speaking to The AUTHORITY on Sunday, one of the illustrious sons of Oko community, Chief Handel Okoli, who was also a former Special Adviser to former Vice-President Ekwueme, who also served as former Special Adviser to former President Olusegun Obasanjo, called on the federal government to come to their aid as they were fast losing their ancestral homes and heritage as a result of the danger posed by the erosion.
Informed sources put the number of casualties to the erosion menace at over 10,00 while even greater number of peo¬ple have been displaced from their homes as a result of the rapid encroaching ero¬sion. Chief Okoli narrated how some of their symbolic traditional sepulchers caved into the erosion ditch, including grave sites of prominent and loved ones and the grave site of one of their former traditional ruler, Igwe Obi.
Speaking during the burial ceremo¬nies of the late Prof Lucy Ekwueme, wife of Igwe (Prof) Laz Ekwueme, Chief Okoli lamented that with the devastating encroachment of the gully, he doubts if the grave site of the wife of their monarch, would be up standing for more than two years. Based on the observations made by this reporter, it is only a matter of time before the erosion gully catches up with the Igwe’s palace, except government quickly intervenes.
Said Chief Okoli: The erosion issue we have in Oko is a long story. It is a well-known erosion site in the country. In fact, it has been described as the most latent and most dangerous erosion sites in the entire Nigeria. When you look at the devastations and the depth of the gully, you will see what am talking about. From Nanka to Oko, it is tales of lamentations; the devastations have claimed so many hectares of land in the past few years. The danger we have right now is that on a yearly basis, especially during the rainy seasons, the erosion site keeps increasing in both its depth and width, at a very astronomical rate.

The problem again is that the re¬sponse of the authorities, especially the federal government is not substantial at all. What is happening here is beyond what the Anambra state government can handle on its own. The magnitude is so great and multifarious with attendant loss of lives that it is actually a federal problem and we have been to the National Assembly several times to elicit their support and assistance to save lives of people daily lost to the erosion here. The Nanka and Oko communities, the two communities worse hit by the devastations and everybody that matter in Nigeria have come here, made promises and it ends there. But, what we need is effective and concerted immediate action because these ero¬sion sites demand an immediate atten¬tion.

We are really, really worried that in the next year or two, even where we are standing now, that is, the entire area where this burial is being conducted, is likely to be taken over by the erosion. Am not sure you will see this grave site in the next two years. Even the Igwe’s palace, as you can see, is too dangerously close to the edge of the erosion. So, we are appealing to the federal government via the Federal Ministry of Environment, to release the money which was approved for checking this erosion because what is causing the problem is that flood water, otherwise called storm-water is entering a big pit. As it is entering the pit, it is weakening the soil and as it is weakening the soil, it is caving in. In the last three years, it has claimed more than 300 meters in terms of length and of course the depth is more than 200 meters.

So we are facing a very big disaster and we are looking forward to govern-ment picking up this issue as a major na¬tional disaster and dealing with it once and for all. The money for this is under the ecological fund, which was designed to take care of situations like this and we have been pleading with the government to release money so that the erosion can be checked, at least a remedial measure in the meantime then, the major lasting work will start later.

We have lost more than 1,000 houses and several people have either been buried in the erosion or displaced. A huge chunk of people from this village have moved to neighbouring towns because of this erosion problem. When you don’t have an ancestral home anymore, what do you do? We don’t know how much was allocated to check the erosion, but I know it runs into billions of naira, but even if they had released up to two billions, it will be enough to temporarily check the erosion, at least, stop this ram¬paging encroachment that you see here.

We are worried that the level of flood water that is entering that erosion site, if it can be directed elsewhere, like it was done in the 80s when Shehu Shagari was in office, it will go a long way in ameliorating the situation. The contractor that did the job at that time made sure that the water rather than evacuate into the pit, was directed elsewhere. This was what saved us until after so many years, when the channel pipe broke into two, the flood water started entering the pit again. So just like I was saying, at the rate we are going, we won’t be standing here in the next few years. So we are appealing to the government, appealing to the President, the Ministers, the Senators, the House of Representatives members and all those big people in government to please do something and save the lives of several people over here because we are losing our ancestral homes and worse of all, several people might die. .