Tales of neglect in Zungeru, Nigeria’s amalgamation town

Seventy-year-old Suleiman Adamu strolled into the tributary, which hitherto flowing content has rescinded into small ponds, bearing a 20-litre jerry-can. A stretch away, three women dug into the sandy exterior to reach out for water beneath. Besides the women, Maryam, 7, Shemssiya, 12 and Hauwa, 13, had scooped full buckets and were preparing to head […]

Seventy-year-old Suleiman Adamu strolled into the tributary, which hitherto flowing content has rescinded into small ponds, bearing a 20-litre jerry-can. A stretch away, three women dug into the sandy exterior to reach out for water beneath. Besides the women, Maryam, 7, Shemssiya, 12 and Hauwa, 13, had scooped full buckets and were preparing to head back to their respective homes.

The tributary links the Inna Maye river around the Gadan Tulu axis of Zungeru town in Wushishi Local Government Area of Niger State and serves as water source for residents, stretching up to the railway.

Malam Adamu said perennial water scarcity was the norm with residents around Gadan Tulu during this time of the year. But the scarcity has not really begun to bite hard. “Within the next two months, the tributary will be completely dry,” he said. 

Close to the bank of the tributary, a huge water treatment stands, with huge distribution pipes disappearing into the tick bushes miles away. Beside the plant is a structure which used to house the standby generator that powered it. The facilities are part of the water supply initiative of the colonial government under Fredrick Lugard.

They had it all planed out. “From this point, the water was treated and distributed to overhead tanks, which supplied the water needs of the administrators and the community at large then,” Dr Abubakar Usman, vice chairman of the Zungeru Community Development Association explained.

However, with the exit of the colonial government, the water supply chain collapsed, along with other social amenities and infrastructure. The gigantic water treatment plant and huge pipes connecting it to the outer world are among the relics of the colonial administration standing today in the ancient town. Dr Usman said since the water supply system collapsed, community members have been battling with the problem, with little or no intervention from government.

Our correspondent observed that some individuals maintained boreholes in their residences, but Usman said those were only temporary measures as most of them hardly lasted three seasons. “Due to the rocky nature of the town, boreholes are useful during the rainy season,” he said.

When Daily Trust on Sunday visited the area penultimate Thursday, only few of the boreholes, mainly those close the river, were functional, while many had already dried up.

A truck of six jerry-cans sells at N300. Malama Fatima Galadima said residents of the town preferred to take the long walk to the river for the untreated water as many could not afford the amount.

Malam Usman said that during the President Olusegun Obasanjo administration, the Federal Government, in collaboration with the World Bank, initiated a water project, which is supposed to take advantage of exiting colonial facility, but the project was abandoned.  He said the then Minister of Water Resources, Alhaji Muktari Shagari, paid an assessment visit to the site, but never looked back before the administration winded up.

Our correspondent noticed that the staff quarters section of the project was already completed while works on the reservoir was suspended midway. Two security personnel, Malam Umar Danbaba, 70, and Malam Hussaini Usman, 69, still guard the facility already put in place. Malam Danbaba said he was engaged 14 years ago, while Malam Hussaini joined him a year later. He said both of them earned monthly stipend of N6, 000 each for their service. According to him, a certain retired General from the area is responsible for the payment of the stipend through a third party.

Our correspondent noticed several water distribution pipes meant for the project and some youths keeping close tab on them. The leader of the youths, Malam Abdulkarim Umar, said they had decided to protect the pipes following an attempt by some government officials to move them for a project elsewhere.

“Some people came here with trucks and tried to move the pipes to somewhere, but we resisted. It is either they use the pipes for the project it was meant for here or they allow them to rot. Nobody

can move them from here; we are ready to die protecting them,” he vowed.

Like water, the town can hardly boast of good road network, while electricity supply has been epileptic. The main road linking Bida town, through which Lugard got to Zungeru from Baro, where he earlier settled, has been in a deplorable condition. All the township roads are begging for attention.

The vice chairman of Zungeru Community Development Association said that apart from individual efforts from Senator Ibrahim Musa and the late General Dantsoho Mohammed, no visible intervention has taken place on the township road network since the colonial administrator exited the scene.

However, fortune seems to be smiling on the ancient town in the area of township roads following the recent announcement by the present administration in the state that it had earmarked N700 million for surface dressing. The state government, it was learnt, equally provided a step-down transformer with the intention of linking the town to Tegina.

However, aside this intervention, the singsong by residents has been that of neglect and abandonment despite the fact that the town played an important role in Nigeria’s evolution.

Zungeru served as the capital of the British Protectorate of Northern Nigeria from 1902 to 1916. It was also the town where Northern and Southern protectorates were joined by Frederick Lugard.

It also served as the birthplace of Nigeria’s indigenous governor-general, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe and home to the late Biafran leader and former military governor of the Eastern State, Chief Chukwuemeka Odimegwu Ojukwu.

Salmanu Yusuf, the chairman of Znugeru Community Development Association, said it was unfortunate that a town that gave birth to the entity called Nigeria and produced its foremost leaders could be so forgotten. He said it was regrettable that the Federal Government could not even preserve the relics of the colonial administration in the state for tourism purpose, adding that in other climes, such opportunity would have served as a source of revenue for government.

“The house where Lugard ran his government; his office and residence; the United Mission Church, built in 1905; the railway terminus; the steam generators that provided 24-hour transmission of electricity and water to colonialists’ homes; officers mess; the head offices of pioneer multinationals, John Holt, the Royal Niger Company and UAC, and of course, the executioner’s gallows, where troublesome traditional rulers were tried and killed, among others, are the many relics that are allowed to waste here,” he explained.

He said the houses where Azikiwe and Ojukwu were born were of no less importance if the Federal Government had cared to preserve them for posterity.

Also speaking on the matter, an elder in the town, Malam Tanko Madaki, said the people had hope that it would at least be made to serve as venue for the celebration of Nigeria’s centenary, but the Federal Government chose to hold it elsewhere.

He said that in 1991, hope had risen for Zungeru with the launch of Zik Centre as a tribute to the late Owelle of Onitsha, but “how the committee, which had names of respected personalities in Nigeria, suffered stillbirth, beats everybody’s imagination”.

Our correspondent learnt that the money announced at the fundraising event, which had the former military president, General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (retd) as special guest of honour, doubled the amount required for the project. But in the end, 80 per cent of the monies pledged were never redeemed.

“The structure that came out of the cash at hand is part of the many relics of Zungeru,” Madaki lamented, adding that the abandoned project shows how ungrateful a nation can be to the town of its birth and leaders.

Daily Trust on Sunday observed that almost all the signposts of the colonial administration are in ruin. When our correspondent visited the ancient town, residents could only point at the locations where some of the edifices used to be.

However, unlike others, the railway segment of Zungeru survived, having been inherited by the Nigeria Railway Corporation. Some of the quarters are still housing members of staff of the corporation. And only slight modifications have taken place in its station.

Also visible are the gigantic columns that once held the famous folding bridge on River Inna, which connects the railway station with the Lugard residence.

“The bridge was for the exclusive use of the governor-general. It derives its name from a foldable extension that was laid out anytime Lugard wanted to cross to and from his lodgings. It is in two parts – the southern embankment of the river and the second section, which could be folded from that point to the embankment,” Salmanu Yusuf explained.

Madaki and other residents appealed to the Federal Government to accord the town what it deserves, through massive infrastructural development and conservation, as well as preservation of what is left of the colonial relics.