Flood: Benin Residents Appeal for Urgent Govt Attention
Residents of flood-ravaged Uselu Shell Street in Benin metropolis have appealed to the Edo State government to urgently address the recurring menace.
Some of the residents, in separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria on Saturday, in Benin said the recurring menace had been giving them sleepless nights, especially during the raining season.
They said the menace had also compounded the environmental degradation of the area.
NAN reports the area leads to the University of Benin Teaching Hospital and also the University of Benin in Ugbowo.
They said Uselu Shell Street lacked proper drainage, a development they noted constitutes environmental and health hazard to residents.
A trader, Patience Osakpanam, who has a shop in Uselu market, said the area had been in a terrible state for many years.
Osakpanam said that during the raining seasons last year, a parent lost a six-year-old daughter, who was on her way home from school.
She said the little girl was carried away by flood.
She called on the state government to urgently construct drainage to address the menace.
Osasuyi Ivie, a resident, said some years ago, people lost their lives while properties worth millions of Naira were swept away by the flood after a heavy downpour.
She also called on the state government to channel the water to a river or a canal, adding that “this will bring huge relief to the residents.”
“For the past three days, it has been raining heavily and I doubt if the rain will stop today“.