Ulunya Ovoko is among the Igboano communities where Enugu State University of Medical and Allied Sciences (SUMAS) is situated. The community that celebrated hosting the university currently faces extinction following flooding due to poor drainage systems of the medical university as well as an alleged road diversion which would have provided the permanent solution to their current nightmare. Their ordeal is the focus of this report by Ben Aroh.
Ulunya Ovoko is an agrarian community with about five thousand inhabitants. When THE WHISTLER visited the community, located behind the State University of Medical and Allied Sciences (SUMAS), it was a mixed feeling as students were seen moving about with their academic activities while the natives anticipate havocs ahead of the rainy season.
Bernard Odo has a hostel at the community. He said, “We hurriedly built some houses when this university started. The investment is worth it. Lands used to be very cheap here, but this university has appreciated our lands.”
Odo’s happiness is not equitably shared by the downside inhabitants of Ulunya Ovoko. The natives have been counting their losses due to flooding.
Aloysius Ezeugwu, aka Across, is the youth leader of the community. For him, the university has brought both good and ugly impulses to his people. He said, “The water channels from SUMAS are directed to our village. The flood has rendered one of our mothers homeless. Last year, flood submerged her house at night, causing the entire building to collapse. Once it begins to rain, we stay on the edge. Water gets even into people’s bedrooms. Some have lost all their livestock due to the flood.
“I am a farmer. We only farm because we don’t have any other place to cultivate. After plantation, flood sweeps everything away. The emerging ecological disasters are our main problems. We are crying bitterly. We need drainages on our road to properly channel these water arteries.”
Emmanuel Chukwuemeka Ugwuanyi is a victim. He said, “During rainy seasons, this place will become an ocean. There was a night I woke and was almost overrun by flood inside my bedroom. Our heart is not at rest ahead of this rainy season.”
Aloysius Okoro is the chief priest of a deity in the community. He said he has been begging the gods to send people to rescue his community from the flood. According to him, “Hon Celestine Asogwa, a former LG chairman of Igboeze South LGA, constructed culverts and graded our road, but they have been washed away. We are happy over the university, but without rechanneling this water, there is danger.
“Even the students are at risk. The road requires drainage systems and culverts. We urge Gov Peter Mbah to continue where ex-Gov Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi stopped by constructing the road from that university to Orba, which passes through Ulunya.”
Janneth Asogwa almost lost her son to the flood last two years. She said, “It would have killed my son, but for the intervention of God. The wall collapsed, and fell beside where he was sleeping. It missed him narrowly.”
Esther Asogwa is another victim. She said, “The flood destroyed my goats and chickens, and also my three houses. It almost killed my late husband when the wall collapsed. My food storage was destroyed. We are being chased out of our ancestral home.”
Hon Celestine Asogwa is a former council chairman of Igboeze South LGA. He constructed the road during his era as chairman. He could only grade the road with some culverts, but after the elapse of his tenure, the drainages and culverts on the road collapsed.
Asogwa said, “This is the road that former Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi was to construct to link the university. It was unfortunately transferred to another side, putting our side in everlasting danger. I believe in God’s time. The front of my house is under threat. Our road is Trunk A. The entire water from the campus passes here. At times, our place becomes flooded, and there is no rainfall down here. We are the water harvesting village, equivalent of a dam. I have gone to Mr Jimoh, a philanthropist, at Ibagwa. He promised to assist us. But he said after he finishes the one he is doing at Ihunowerre.
“Ahead of this rainy season, there is anxiety in our place. We have started opening some blocked gutters. But there is nothing we can do without the government support. By right, LGA authorities should help. The immediate past chairman of Igboeze South LGA would have assisted us, unfortunately the LG grader is not functional.”
One Amandi, from Ovoko, said he mobilised his people to the Enugu State Government House to report the ecological problem. According to him, “We took this matter to the Government House. We told former Gov Ugwuanyi about our plight, but he was unable to solve the problem before his tenure elapsed.”