Gully Erosion Threatens  Lives, Property, Regional Water Scheme in Abia

Emmanuel Ugwu-Nwogo in Umuahia

Community and religious leaders have raised  the alarm in Umuizundu autonomous community, Isuochi in Umunneochi Local Government of Abia State as prospect of more environmental devastation looms with the onset of rainy season.

The leaders, who cried out at the weekend when journalists visited a frightening gully erosion site at Umuogele, Umuizundu, said that the prospect of further devastation of their houses, farmlands and economic trees has set the community on edge.

One of the major water project of Abia State, the Isuochi Regional Water Scheme has also come under serious threat as the pump building is dangerously close to the erosion site would take another rainy season for it to cave into the menacing gully.

The leaders therefore, called on both the Abia State government of Governor Alex Otti and the federal government to take urgent steps and save the community from further environmental devastation.

The President General of Umuizundu Development Union, Hon Daniel Okoroafor told, journalists that the community has been making efforts over the years to fight off the erosion menace without success.

“It has become a life-threatening issue,” he said, adding that “the rainy season is here and we’re afraid of further escalation of the environmental problem,” he said.

“We want the world to hear us before we are swallowed by this gully erosion,” he added.

The erosion site, which covers a distance of about four kilometres from its point of origin at Umuogele along the Amuda-Mbala road has been expanding its flanks every rainy season with width reaching up to 200 metres at some points.

A religious leader, Very Rev Godwin Ikechukwu, who is a retired Methodist minister, lamented that the erosion menace “has divided our community into two.”

He stated that it has hampered physical development of the community as “nobody can build on a land like this” where erosion would one day come and swallow the building.

The man of God said that following representation made to the Abia State Ministry of Environment, a team came and assessed the erosion site and its impact on the communities but nothing has been heard thereafter.

The traditional Prime Minister (PM) of the community, Ichie Onwuanaku Uwalaka, who represented the traditional ruler, said that farming in the agrarian community has suffered a devastating blow as people no longer have access to the farmlands.

He said that people have resorted to farming around their residences since erosion had taken over the farmlands, destroying crops and cutting off the access road.

The traditional PM said that the community had in previous years lost two young men who were swept away by the raging flood when they fell into the gully.

He traced the origin of the erosion menace to over 40 years, saying that what had started as a small channel for running water was exacerbated in 2017 by the construction firm that handled the Amuda- Mbala road.

According to him, the firm had channeled all flood water from neughbouring communities to Umuogele without carrying out environmental impact assessment (IEA).

“We are pleading and asking government to come to our aid. We have tried our best but it was not enough,” he said.