Residents of the Dagbalodo community in Kpada Ward I, Patigi Local Government Area, Kwara State, are excavating for water using their hands for drinking and household purposes.

Residents are said to have to wait for the water to gather after digging the sand before retrieving it and repeating the process multiple times to fill a large bowl.

During the dry season, it can take more than 5 hours to collect water after the hand digging method has been performed multiple times.

Residents bemoaned their position, saying that portable water has been a luxury in the village for years, forcing them to consume polluted, untreated water.

Residents screamed out for assistance as the community’s scarcity of potable water worsened.

Residents of the community, according to a female member of the group, must go through this incredibly rigorous procedure of excavating the earth with their hands to acquire water.

“We have to wait for several hours for the water to accumulate, depending on the season, before fetching,” she explained.

“During the dry season, it takes about 5 hours to get a small quantity of water from one of the holes which we drink and use for other domestic purposes.

“We are pleading for help from any quarters before this gets out of hand.”

Barrister Yusuf Abdulkadir Nafanwona, a representative of the Elites Network for Sustainable Development (ENetSuD), a Patigi-based anti-corruption civil society organization, informed Daily Trust that the condition of the people has been brought to the attention of concerned authorities in the council.

He said, ‘Our team visited the community last week and the Transition Implementation Committee (TIC) Chairman of Patigi has been informed.”

“He promised to get back to us but we have not heard from him yet.

“So, we also look beyond that by calling on public-spirited individuals to come to their rescue. The situation is very pathetic,” he added.

Mohammed Ibrahim Liman, the head of the TIC in Patigi, informed our reporter over the phone that efforts to remedy the problem were in high gear.

He said, “Yes, we are aware of it and we have spoken with the contractor who should be on site before the end of the month.

“The Senator representing Kwara North, Sadiq Umar, through one of his constituency projects, is sinking a borehole in the community.”