Inside Abuja’s manhole of death

Despite the environmental hazard and other disasters blocked manholes strewn around Abuja expose the people dwelling the capital…

Despite the environmental hazard and other disasters blocked, manholes strewn around Abuja expose the people dwelling in the capital city as the openings are becoming death traps of some sorts.

The Federal Capital Territory has continued to suffer from humongous theft and or vandalism of public property, especially road infrastructure. Prominent among these is manhole cover theft.

But unfortunately, vandalism or theft of manhole cover is dismissed with a wave of the hand that very few take even a distant look at the death-traps or peep into the holes to the see mangled bodies of Abuja dwellers or hear the moan of the helpless victims.

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It is not something new to see a wide mouth manhole in the capital city, waiting to swallow preys caught unaware; what people pay less attention to is how the holes deform every unlucky victim.

Inside the hole is a frightening world inhabited by rodents, reptiles and other life-threatening objects. While the luckiest victims survive with scratches, others sustain fractures.

Olamide (not real name) is one of those who have survived the traumatic experience by the skin of his teeth. He was trying to dodge a hit from a dispatch rider when he slipped into a manhole at Finance Bridge in the Central area, where people board buses to Lugbe, Kuje and Gwagwalada.

Olamide was standing on the pedestrian pathway when the dispatch rider climbed the pathway. Of a sudden, he fell into the very deep manhole and the story turned bloody.

Even though  Olamide survived with a swollen head, bruises all over his body and his clothes tattered as though he wrestled a wild animal, the experience has continued to haunt him.

“My ambition is to see all manholes around Abuja covered,”  Olamide said.

He explained, “Immediately I fell into the hole, the water almost reached my neck. I lost my phone and some personal belongings in the hole. I was lucky that a passer-by noticed when I slipped into the death trap, and for this, scores of Good Samaritans were involved in the tediously energy-sapping mission to save my life.”

He added that a stick was stretched to him by kind-hearted Nigerians in order to pull him out of the manhole.

He said, “I held it very tight, but in the cause of lifting me up, the stick broke and I fell back inside. Another man stretched his leg, I also held it tight, but in the course of drawing me up, the man’s footwear slipped off my hand and I fell again.”

After two failed attempts, another young man volunteered his leather belt, but it didn’t work out either.

Still recounting the experience, he stated, “Then a taxi driver brought out his dry Jeans trouser, he stretched it and I held it tightly, that was how I was miraculously rescued at the fourth attempt.”

As soon as  Olamide came out, he realised that he had lost his phone and other belongings, but he was elated that his life was saved at last.

Another resident, Ahmed Nuhu, said that he was alone when of a sudden someone called to tell him that his brother had fallen into a manhole at the Federal Secretariat-Airport Road.

He said the victim was rescued by some youths after falling into the manhole but was hospitalized for many months.

According to him, his brother, Ibrahim, stumbled and fell into the hole one night.

Nuhu said, “Luckily there were some passengers waiting by the road when he accidentally fell into the hole. Some youths saved his life, but because of the injuries he sustained, he was hospitalized for months.”

Blocked manholes expose residents to disaster

Poor drainage system resulting from blocked manholes due to improper disposal of refuse exposes residents to environmental dangers. Apparently, the slogan “Keep Abuja Clean” exists only on paper, considering how people dispose of waste materials carelessly.

This poor habit of cleanliness may affect many areas and lead to flooding, diseases, erosion, among other environmental disasters.

Refuse dumps by road sites are common in many locations in Abuja. This menace becoming a common feature of markets in the capital city. Some residents in the capital city decry how blocked drainages threaten their lives in many ways.

Authority moves to stop vandals

Efforts to get comments from Abuja Metropolitan Management proved abortive; but to arrest the situation, the Minister of the FCT, Malam Muhammad Bello, in 2021, appealed to the Inspector General of Police to apprehend those removing manhole covers, including electrical and telecommunication cables and railway tracks.