By Uche Asobie
Inspite of the proclamations of democracy dividends across the country, it is not yet Eldorado in some other parts of the country. To many residents of Bwari, a local council in the FCT, there is little cause for cheer under the country’s new found democracy.
After two terms of eight years each under the watch of the sons of the soil, pretty little is on ground in terms of development. The access roads to the secretariat, untouched in that terrible state of disrepair all these years, had often been hurriedly sand-papered and overlaid with stone dust. Before now the tract of hardly more than one hundred meters had more than two hundred potholes. None of the duo of Peter Ushafa and Issa Dara thought it necessary to repair the roads. But the irony of this is not lost on the people. A village leader, who craved anonymity, wondered where the hope of the people laid.
Bwari is the most important metropolitan town in the council with its administrative apparatus, federal establishments and business ventures to boot, jostling for positions. It is a major money-dispensing point, with JAMB, the Nigerian Law School and the local council hosting thousands of workers and contractors each month. No doubt then Bwari has its fair share of the hustle and bustle of the organized chaos of everyday business environment.
But none of these tend to impact on the surrounding villages and communities. Kushikwo, which hosts the Kushikwo Resettlement for persons displaced by the development of Jabi and Utako, and others, is still as rural as it can be.
In Barangoni as in Gaba, Zuma and Kuduru, the people are, however, all praises for the Millennium Development Goals project.
Chief Solomon Azabo, the village head of Gaba community said, ‘our primary health care system is coming through the MDG and are quite appreciative of the efforts better than lots of the community.
In Zuma, the community said MDG project personnel had been coming to help them process some of their agricultural produce. They also said it was the MDGs that gives credit for their water.
Chief Danlami Nana, Chief of Barangoni, said the health centre of the community was donated by Julius Berger Construction Company as part of its social responsibility to the community.
It may then not be surprising that areas where the people were impacted on and to which they readily expressed happiness where external bodies were involved through the Federal Government and international donor agencies.
Whether the area council would receive credit for such or not, it is remarkable to note that no effort is being made by it to cash into these good gestures and passable successes of the MDG project.
One would have expected the area council to be able to provide and maintain doctors and other health personnel for these health centres. This is one of the critical problems of Gaba community, according to Chief Azabo. They need doctors who will reside in the community so that in time of emergency they can find a ready attendant.
For now, there are no officials to supervise and oversee the boreholes and render agricultural extension services to the people. Many of the villagers complained of the boreholes having faults, and the villagers having to recourse to levying members to effect repairs.
In Barangoni, as at the time of going to press, the people have gone for days without water, because the last time it did, it was the traditional ruler who paid for the repairs. He had not been able to do so, this time.
All the villagers also complained of having to go to Bwari for secondary education. No secondary school is located in any of these villages. Ordinand Levi Chukwuma, a religious leader, in Ushaffa, lamented that ‘our children are being taken away.’
Walking through the Bwari town and the adjoining villages, one finds it difficult to point to the visible signs of the gains of democracy. The visible signs of the achievements of successive local administrations in Bwari Area council are glaringly absent. And if the billboard advertising Peter Yohanna Ushafa over uncompleted Dutse market is anything to go by, then there are few places indeed where similar adverts could be made.
If this is not an advertisement of the incapabilities of the people who have been there at the helm, it is definitely an advertisement of the serious loss on the hapless people of Bwari Area Council.
Development means much more than houses, infrastructure and enhanced economic activities. It is about a change in the psyche, mental capability, growth in understanding and application of rationality in life’s situations as well as objective outlook on life and existence.
Are the sons of the soil traversing the political space offering the platform for these?
