… urges people to do things right

By Abdul Momoh

Kwara State Commissioner for Environment and Natural Resources, Architect Aliyu Mohammed Saifudeen has said that the Kwara State Government under the leadership of would respond appropriately towards the reconstruction of the collapsed Oko-Erin bridge.

He stated this during a briefing with newsmen in his office recently.

Accordion to Arc. Saifudeen, ‘having visited the collapsed bridge myself, as well as the Deputy Governor and other agencies of the government, something will be done soonest.’

“The Kwara State Government is an active one. We have all visited the scene of the incident, we will make our recommendation known to the Governor and I can assure you that something will be done soonest,” he said.

The Commissioner who swung into action immediately the bridge collapsed had an assessment tour of the place and attributed the damage to technical faults.

“What we observed in that place is something that is bound to happen when you had a torrential rainfall. It is unexpected, but what we’re talking about now is what next.

“What really happened was that the river overtired coming to that bridge change course and in the process it hit the ring-wall from the water bound side and after hitting the wall, it now directed to the culvert proper.

“So in the process, of course by the time it hits, you know how water moves and it moves with whatever that comes it way. In that case there will be water spillage, as that now shocked the wall behinds the ring-wall and when that happened, the weights of the soil increases as the ring-wall couldn’t contains it. That is what led to the collapse”, he affirmed.

Continuing, ‘another thing that led to it is that the water usually comes with refuses. One of the passage was blocked and that led a high level of water.’

“Indiscriminate dumping of refuse has to do with mindset. We should endeavor to behaves well anytime, not saying the government didn’t provides waste bin. The present Kwara State Government is working on that and we have distributed waste bin across the state.

“My appeal to the people of the state is to imbibe a proper mindset. We have to learn to do things right. We should at all times think of how to help our community, we should help ourselves by ourselves.

“That doesn’t mean that the Government should not be held accountable, because that is what she swears to do. Our environment has a direct link with the welfare of the people. If our environment is good, there is no business for our hospitals. We should cease from dumping refuse indiscriminately,” the commissioner concluded.  

  Architect Aliyu Mohammed Saifudeen, Governor Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq, Kwara State, Oko Erin