Leadership (Abuja)  Nigeria: Floods - Let's Stop the Blame Game
(I)   The floods that bedevilled most river basins in Nigeria
this year were predicted by NIMET and have been particularly
devastating. No wonder, discussions about water in the media
have been dominated by news of flood disasters, but mostly
concentrated on issues of politics of floods. At the end of the
rainy season, we will have respite, but the trend in occurrence
of flood disasters shows no signs of abetting in years to come.
Freshwater resources is source of life but only if it is managed
well. As Kofi Annan puts it: "The task is not just to preserve
water resources to sustain life, but also to reduce the capacity
of water to take life away. ....we can and must reduce the
number and impact of disasters by building sustainable
communities that have the long-term capacity to live with risk."
The nation's response to the flood has been anything but
articulate and comprehensive. All we have done is to react after
the disastrous events to provi