Alhaji Usman Ahmed, General Manager of Yobe State Water Corporation and a seasoned Civil Servant, in an interview with newsmen including SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT Mohammed Abubakar, he speaks on efforts of the State in providing portable water to the populace. Excerpts:
Sir, what can you say on Urban Water Supply scheme of Yobe State?
As you may be aware, urban water supply scheme comprises all the 17 local government areas of Yobe State plus three other places making 20, all these are being controlled by Yobe state Water Corporation. We do not have problems of serving our consumers, we have not received any complaint of water scarcity. Soon, we will visit Nguru town and overhaul two of their power generating sets in order to boost their water circulation.
What are your major challenges?
Well everything in life is about challenges, our consumers do not want to pay their bills. And we have been announcing over the television, radio, but still our revenue is falling. I am begging them to comply and pay to enable government do more as we are lucky our amiable Governor Ibrahim Gaidam accords greater attention on water supply. Whenever we forward our submissions, he promptly approves and releases funds. He does not travel out until he attends to our files on his table. Recently Yobe State government improved our manpower via the employment of 74 personnel (University graduates, diploma holders and certificates) and posted to our Board, this would go a long way in facilitating our operations.
How do you think employment of new staff to your board will reposition things?
Yes, it will help us greatly, it will ease our operation because sometimes we have one operator per borehole but now three people were assigned to manage a borehole. We collect 44,000 litres of Diesel for Damaturu boreholes alone, we give out lubricants for all the generating sets.
So you are giving credit on water supply to Governor Gaidam?
Of course, he has shown much concern on water provision against the past administration, we must praise him. Go round all the 17 local government areas of Yobe State; you would see water running in taps.
How many boreholes were under your corporation?
Yes, we have over 263 boreholes across the state. The number is increasing because of the poverty alleviation programme and our corporation in Damaturu alone has 62 boreholes.
What do you think government can do to improve the sector?
In the case of water, we have places that require drilling of more boreholes especially where there are abortive boreholes or places with population increase, though if I go to His Excellency he would grant us approval. Recently, we drilled two boreholes at Zanna Zakariya Housing Estate and DA 20 Commissioners Quarters; the project was out of my budget but the governor agreed and released the fund, they are now fully functional.
What message do you have for the water consumers?
Prayers to our government and that consumers promptly pay their bills which is only N300 per month. If they can buy one wheelbarrow of water from vendors at N200, imagine we only charge N300 per month. They do not know the purity of the water from vendors, but ours is guaranteed.
Moreso, they should report any leakage of pipelines to the corporation, or whatever problem. We have dedicated phone numbers, our staff are always available to serve our consumers. So, let them report, rather than sit idly, blaming us.
Are you satisfied with services of PHCN in your corporation?
No. We do not rely on their power supply because as we speak, here in Damaturu we have spent four days without electricity. Even when they give power, the voltage is very low and can not generate power enough to carry our boreholes. Hence we rely on our generators.
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