Flooding: No agreement with Cameroon on dam construction – FG

Minister of Water Resources, Suleiman Adamu, on Wednesday, denied that Nigeria entered into an agreement with Cameroon to build a dam that will mitigate flooding when water from the Lagdo Dam is released.

The minister stated this while appearing for budget defence before Senate Committee on Water Resources in Abuja.

There had been viral reports that Nigeria entered into an agreement with Cameroon in 1983 to build a buffer dam to mitigate flooding when water from the Lagdo Dam is released.

But Adamu said there is no record of such an agreement but while the government is in the process of building the Dasin Dam to mitigate flooding from Cameroon’s Lagdo Dam, there are engineering concerns.

Adamu said Cameroon did not inform Nigeria about the release of water from the Lagdo Dam until 24 hours after it was released.

The minister further said the Lagdo Dam contributes only one percent to the flooding in Nigeria, even though sometimes the water is released without notice.

According to him, 80 per cent of the floods in parts of Nigeria are as a result of ceaseless rainfalls.

Floods have hit parts of Nigeria in the last two months with the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) saying that about 2.5 million persons were affected and over 603 persons killed by the flooding caused by torrential rainfall of late.

Houses and farmlands have been submerged in Lagos, Yobe, Borno, Taraba, Adamawa, Edo, Delta, Kogi, Niger, Plateau, Benue, Ebonyi, Anambra, Bauchi, Gombe, Kano, Jigawa, Zamfara, Kebbi, Sokoto, Imo, Abia states, and the Federal Capital Territory.