Bad road: Kano communities threaten to boycott 2019 elections

Residents of five communities in Kumbotso local government area of Kano state have threatened to boycott the routine polio immunization and 2019 general elections if the authorities concerned fail to rehabilitate their damaged road that makes the areas inaccessible especially during rainy season. The affected communities are Yanlemo ‘Yan-Tasi, Mai Kalwa, Wailari, Kwarin Goje and […]

Residents of five communities in Kumbotso local government area of Kano state have threatened to boycott the routine polio immunization and 2019 general elections if the authorities concerned fail to rehabilitate their damaged road that makes the areas inaccessible especially during rainy season.

The affected communities are Yanlemo ‘Yan-Tasi, Mai Kalwa, Wailari, Kwarin Goje and Umarawa.

Kano Chronicle observed that the residents have been battling with flooding, erosion and other related challenges courtesy of lack of good drainages.

The Chairman, Amalgamation of Wailari and Mai Kalwa Communities’ Associations, Alhaji Nura Danjuma, said the affected communities had channeled their complaints to relevant authorities with a view to addressing the problem but their appeals were unsuccessful.

“We have done the needful but it seems the authorities are not willing to address our plight. In view of this, the amalgamation of all associations in the affected areas has resolved that residents of the communities will boycott subsequent immunization exercises and the 2019 general elections.

“There is no point participating in the exercises while government is not paying any attention to our plights. Since our representatives at both local and state levels are not proactive in addressing our problems, there is no point of partaking in the elections,” he said.

A visit to the affected areas by our reporter indicated that erosion had consumed a large portion of the only road that linked some of the communities in the area. The road, which starts from Yanlemo, was constructed over eight years ago and since then it has not been rehabilitated despite several pleas by members of the communities.

Malam Ya’u Yahaya, a resident of  Wailari community, said whenever there was rain many people had to pass their night elsewhere because they could not use the road to access their respective homes.

“Last year, we lost three members of this community including two children. The deceased tried to reach their homes after a heavy downpour but lost their lives while trying cross an overflooded ditch. It has become a tradition in this area that whenever it rained, some of us had to sleep in other places.

The road has become a threat to our lives,” Yahaya lamented.

Also commenting on the development, Malama Hafsatu Muhammad of Wailari, said the communities had made a right decision to let the government and general public know the difficulty they were experiencing.

She said, “Of what important is it for us to continue voting for people whose priority is something else? They are more concern on immunization and politics  than our wellbeing. We are in a disorganized condition; something has to be done to address this carelessness.”

Further observation revealed that most of public schools in the affected areas have to close for some days whenever it rained, as lesson could not hold in most of the classrooms due to their bad condition.

Children’s education, according to some members of the communities, was inconsistent in the rainy season.

Business activities in the affected communities have also been relegated to its lowest level due to lack of good road that made it difficult for customers to access the communities.