Saliu Osifueme Ahmed is the immediate past managing director/executive director of Benin Owena River Development Basin Authority (BORDA). He is a civil engineer, specialised in Water and Transportation. In this interview with IDRIS UMAR MOMOH, he spoke on how under his leadership of BORDA that was ranked worst of the 12 River Basins in the country was now ranked number three. Excerpts:
How will you describe your eight years of two tenures in BORDA?
It was a fulfilling experience. It gave me an opportunity to contribute in my own ways to moving our country forward. The Benin Owena River Development Authority (BORDA) is an agency in the water sector aligned with my professional calling. It gave me an opportunity to put into practice some of the things that we learnt in schools and also experienced those in my professional practices. Working under the public service rules with other public servants was quite a major eye-opener. In the BORDA, I was able to work with other career public servants, and other political appointees like myself at the level of Executive Director, I was able to direct the affairs of the authority to achieve a number of things in line with the mandate of the River Basins.
The primary mandate was the development of the water resources to meet all the used water serves both domestic, agricultural and hydro-power generations, among others. I would say that I came up fulfilled that we were able to impact on different people, different communities across the catchment states that the BORDA superintendent. I also thanked God for the opportunity.
What have been your major achievements in the eight years in the authority?
First and foremost, I think I was able to reposition the BORDA in particular. Before my appointment, BORDA was ranked as the worst of all the 12 River Basin Development Authorities in the country. But, by the time I was leaving, it was ranked among the best three. For me, that was a major achievement. How that ranking came about was because of the impact we were able to make along the line of the mandate of the agency. First, we were able to provide potable water to a number of communities even in cases where it was not impossible for us to extract water on the ground we cracked it. Before, I came on board for instance, the Edo Central Senatorial district was largely rated as an area where boreholes were impossible to drill, but by the time, I was leaving the office, we successfully drilled at least three functioning boreholes in Uromi, another three in Irrua, two in Ewatto in Esan South East Local Government Area and one around Ekpoma. These boreholes went to a depth of over 1000 feet. That was partly achieved because of the leadership I offered.
Read also: Benin-Owena River Basin commissions four integrated farms in Edo
During my tenure, I challenged our hydro-geologists and engineers that we are not only associated with just drilling of hand dug wells which other people were doing, but we should be a goal better organisation as far as water and water related issues are concerned. So, we went to the fields, carried out necessary studies and out of the understanding of the terrains we went to work, and we were able to get water successfully.
For me, that is one the achievements were recorded. I only used Edo central Senatorial district as a case study because hitherto it has been taking for granted that you could never achieve that. But we did across the entire catchment areas of BORDA. All parts of Edo, Ondo, Ekiti and Delta states (Delta North). For your information, it is easier to drill boreholes because of the sedimentary base that Ondo and Ekiti states belong to, but is much more difficult in part of Edo and Delta states. But we were able to drill successfully.
But by the grace of our efforts a number of communities today get potable water. We also initiated projects for the construction officers of some major water schemes. We initiated the construction of a dam in Otuo, in Owan East Local Government Area of Edo state. The project is still ongoing. But it is gratifying to note that we got as far as over 50% of the effort. The dam is yet to be completed but the number of other components around the dam have reached an appreciable level of work. In addition to that we also initiated efforts through studies to carry out some Regional Water Schemes in Auchi and Jattu in Etsako West Local Government Area. The one in Jattu is currently ongoing. It has been constrained by funds. But construction works have started while the one in Auchi, we successfully built a 3million litres complete tank which will be part of the infrastructure for the water supply to Auchi in the future. We were also able to rehabilitate a number of existing dams in our catchment areas. In Edo State, we were able to rehabilitate a dam which has been existing and said to be leaking. We arrested the leakage, the dam is Ukhun-Erha dam around Ekpoma in Esan West Local Government Area. The dam is for irrigation and aquaculture. We did the same thing in Ondo state. Today, the dam is fully functioning, and in Ekiti State, we also rehabilitated a dam for irrigation purposes.
These are asides, the number of rural infrastructures like roads that we constructed across our catchment areas. In a sense, I will say, I am fulfilled that we were able to do a bit with the resources available to us during the period of my stewardship at the Benin Owena River Development Authority. When, I was in the office, we set up four integrated farms. One in Obayator in Ikpoba Okha Local Government Area, one in Auchi, Okpe and Uneme-Nokha in Akoko-Edo local government area. All the farms are thriving and in production. In fact, because of the relative expertise that we have attained in setting up these farms, we were invited to set up one in Abia state which is currently ongoing. Though Abia state is not in our catchment state but because of the relative success we attained in setting up the ones we did in Edo state, the then member of National Assembly, now a current minister of state for Labour and Employment, Mrs Nkeiruka Onyejeocha invited us and made provision in BORDA budget to set up one in her constituency in Abia state. The farms are thriving, but one major step I took before leaving the office was to try and cascade them into a public private partnership. We started the process but by the rules of government there is a long process to moving government infrastructures to private partnership. We have appointed a transaction advisor and the documentation is currently ongoing for the farms to secure the approval of the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) which is the first step towards getting suitable private investors.
The input of it is that there will be enough funding and the right management to keep the farms in continuous productions. The farms are patterned along the Songhai farm in Port Novo in Benin Republic. They are coexisting in the productions of both crops and animals in such a way that there is a zero-waste policy. The farms are into livestock, poultry, and fishery. One of the farms has a cattle ranch. Some have piggery, goats. On the crops side we have cassava, vegetables and also processing cassava into tumeric garri, among others.
Sir, in the eight years, what are those challenges that you encountered in the course of your job as the MD/ED of the authority? Which solutions did you proffer to address the challenges?
Quite frankly, there were challenges. Some were human, systemic and others that may be described as natural. Some of the systemic challenges, I will say like I said before that I was coming into the public sector for the first time. As it were, I was a greyhound And I had to quietly learn and adapt myself to the public service rules. So, that means relating with a number of other institutions, individuals, stakeholders and among others.
But we navigated the challenges, and somehow, we understood the system and we worked within the system to be able to move forward.
Some other human challenges are that there were some persons in the authority whose stock in trade was giving out official secrets, using them to try and pull down the system. But truth will always overshadowed falsehood, as it were we stood our ground and defended the integrity of the agency, and surmounted those challenges. There were also financial challenges. That again is normal because resources will never be enough. But what we did was to ensure that we work with the resources at our disposal to deliver on our mandates. For instance, when I came in 2017 our annual appropriation was less than N1 billion. That was actually the least of all the 12 River Basins in the country. Like I said in the beginning we were ranked as the worst River Basins Development Authority maybe that explained why we were getting the least resources, but overtime, in a matter of 2 years when they saw the potentials of the River Basin and by the time I was leaving the office our annual appropriation was increased to an average of N6 billion from less than N1 billion.
We tried to do the most we can with those resources. From those resources, we were able to improve on the equipment base of the establishment. Within the space of three years, we acquired about 10 tractors, some heavy-duty machineries like graders, a wheel loader, excavator, two bulldozers, in addition to some we met. These machineries boosted the equipment base of the organisation, and helped us to render services both to ourselves and others as well as generate revenues for the government.
When I was leaving, we were one of the revenue generating River Basins in the country.
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