The Taraba State commissioner for? Environment and Urban Development, Mr. Danfulani Kwataka, yesterday said that residents of Jalingo, the Taraba State capital, would soon witness demolition following their lukewarm attitude to the state government’s instructions on building construction within the metropolis.
Kwataka, who disclosed this to our correspondent in an exclusive interview in his office, noted that the recent flooding that afflicted the state capital resulted from the fact that the people ignored government’s instructions on how to construct buildings in the state capital.
The commissioner also revealed to our correspondent that most of the victims of the flood were those that were compensated in 2005 when floods claimed many lives and a lot of property in the state capital.
“They were even given? plots of land outside that area to go and settle in but they sold these plots and returned to the same area; now it (flood disaster) has happened to them again,” he stated.
The commissioner, however, told our correspondent that the state government would be selective this time around incoming to the aid of the flood victims, stating that those that were compensated in 2005 but refused to leave the area would not be considered.
“We will soon commence the demolition in areas that were wrongly constructed in order to actualise cleanliness in Jalingo and create roads where people desided to construct buildings on their own without approval from Urban Development agency; and we are going to do it very soon,” he said.
?He noted that the only factor delaying the exercise was that demolition equipment were under repair, for which “the governor, in his wisdom, has given us N8 million and as I am talking to you, we are almost done with repairs”.
He, therefore, advised the people of Jalingo to desist from the indiscrimate construction of buildings which blocked drainages and caused erosion in the state capital.
?while he noted that water will always resist when and where her movement and freedom is been tempered with.
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