By: Kate Obi/Kaduna
Gyengyere community, a remote village in Kajuru Local Government Area of Kaduna State with about 350,000 population especially farmers have cried out for the assistant of the State Ministry of Rural Development and its Representatives in the State House of Assembly to come to their aid on the collapsed bridge in the community linking to other surrounding communities.
According to the Community Secretary, Mr. Thomas Azuru while narrating the distress movement of the residents with their farm produce due to collapsed bridge to Kaduna-based Health Reporters who were on a developmental facility tour to Kajuru LGA and organized by DevComs lamented that the bridge constructed by the State Government 5 months ago did not do the work it was constructed for and its collapsed.
According to Mr. Azuru, if not that corruption is involved in the construction of the bridge with outdated or poor materials, why would a bridge build to last for 10-15 years at most will collapsed within 5 month giving the residents hard labour to cross over to reach other communities to sell their farm products.
“The collapsed bridge is the only link to villages such as Kikwarin, Kujemi, Angwar Wahala, Ungwar Sunday, Angwar Zawo, Kajuru and Angwar Sarki among others. So you can see that because of the collapsed bridge, our farm produce were getting rotten due to lack of mean of transportation to these villages during market days to sell them.
“If the bridge would not yield any result, the state government would have left the road with the way the villages have been managing it as we have pass through hell during the raining season. 5 people almost lost their lives when they fell into the river trying to cross over but luckily was rescued by some farmers nearby.
“The way the road was, is less stressful than now because the more we try to put a crossover, the more the rain is digging and expanding it leading the villages to contribute more money than expected to look for alternative way. It is not easy for us at all.
“When the bridge collapsed, I am the very person that wrote to our present District Head of Kudana, Mr. Titus Dauda and complained about the collapse bridge and the people’s predicament and he quickly take action and send his delegate to come and see.
“When the delegates come, they saw the collapsed bridge and write to the LGA as they authorized the delegates to snap pictures of the collapsed bridge as an evidence for more action. Since then, we have not seen or heard from anybody from the authority of Kaduna State to ameliorate our suffering. I did not stop there, l went to a member of the State House of Assembly and lay complain about the bridge he came by himself and told us that the project is a LG project not the state.
“He advised us to find a solution that would help us to cross over to the other communities so they community ask him for an assistant for a temporary cross over to enable us transport our farm produce to markets which is the only sources of our living.
“He gave us some money which we used it to build this temporary bridge with the mobilization of the youth which enables motorcyclists to cross our farm produces and then look for alternative transportation to the market. Some times because no car, our products will not reach the market in time and we will not sell them” he stressed.
In an interview with the Emir of Kajuru, Alhaji Alhassan Adamu in his Palace confirmed the story and worried about the bad roads, size of the hospital, the collapsed bridge that have cut off about ten communities from the Local Government and appealed to the officials responsible to rebuild the collapsed bridge to come to their rescues as the people are really suffering.
“We are happy to receive you here in this town. We are now having much problem, though the state government is doing a lot to improve the lives of our people especially in the area of Education and Health, As we speak, the only PHC we have is very small with few nurses which is not enough to cater for the Local Government.
“Only few of our children go to school although in the past we have security challenges but that too has reduced drastically due to the measures taken by the government and security agencies and now the issue of the collapse bridge is another headache to my people because the only hospital (Primary Health Care-PHC) in this Emirate is small. You will not believe it, the PHC is only one room apartment.
“I appealed to Governor Nasir El- Rufai to upgrade the only PHC to a standard hospital, adding that the Local Government lacks professional doctors and cannot meet the demands of over hundred thousand women leaving in the area. I also enjoining the people in the local government to embrace peace to move the area forward” the Emir noted.
In a chart with some of the women in the LG, especially the pregnant and nursing mothers, Hadiza Lukman who gave birth through CS after she was rushed to hospital and the workers were not on duty narrated her ordeal; “I almost lost my life because I was in labour and the health workers were not on duty. That was around 8:am that very day. So, I was rushed to another PHC located in another village.
“The nurse on duty said she cannot handle my case so they took me to a clinic called Asibitin Daji (Bush Hospital) where I was operated upon. This is why we are calling on the authority concerned to please help us with another standard Primary Health Care-Center and to also ask the health workers to always be on duty on time so that they can help in saving lives.
Hajiya Rabi Mohammed 35, explained; “We need hospital in this village because out of my six children, three were delivered at home, three at the clinic.
“Personally I prefer to deliver at home but I make sure I attend antenatal care. During antenatal we are taught how to take care of ourselves and also the unborn baby. Why some women don’t like going for antenatal was due to our bad road and so we are appealing to government to help us” they explained.
