FLOODING AND PLANNING IN NIGERIAN CITIES

Climate change which has been defined as any long term significant change in the expected patterns of average weather of a specific area over an appropriate period of time is mostly characterized by, sea level rise which directly threatens coastal settlements across the earth. Ice melting especially at the Antartica is one of such which is responsible for sea rise in the first instance. Estimates have it that over 13,000 kilometers of ice has been lost in the past five decades resulting in the severe, unpredictable weather evident in the disturbing irregular rainfall patterns we now experience yearly. 

However, the issue of flooding which is also a manifestation of climate change is the topmost concern in our communities today. But before I continue, I like to emphasize the fact that rainfall is not the only cause of flooding. In Nigeria, our almost absolute disregard for urban and regional planning (town planning) at all levels is significantly responsible for this disaster.

Sometimes in June, 2012, the Nigerian Institute of Town Planners (NITP) and the Town Planners Registration Council of Nigeria (TOPREC) held a Mandatory Continuing Professional Development Programme (MCPDP) at Lokoja in Kogi State. The theme of that edition which happens to be the 14^th in the series was CLIMATE CHANGE: Challenges for Physical Planning in Nigeria. A renowned town planner, Dr. Kingsley C. Ogboi, the Director at the Centre for Environmental Management and Control (CEMAC), University of Nigeria, Enugu campus did first presentation. The title was An Overview of Climate Change: Causes, Processes and Manifestations. His take on flooding got my attention because a couple of my friends and family members reside in an area synonymous with perennial flooding.

Ogboi noted that, “In Nigeria climate change is seriously affecting the hydrological system. Flood risk is becoming a serious challenge to urban (and rural) management in the country. There are growing evidences of flood disaster in the urban centres. For example, in July 2007, heavy rainfall caused a major flood in Ogun State and many houses and bridges along a river bank were washed away, displacing about 472 families and rendering occupants of over 260 houses homeless. In Lagos similar heavy rains in 2011 caused a dam to overflow into neighbouring communities. Some thousand persons were displaced in this incidence. On 26^th August 2011, Ibadan recorded a heavy rainfall which was its highest in five decades. The rainfall on that day hit an all-time high of 187.50mm, accompanied by wind gusts reaching 65 kilometer/hour.”

The highpoint of the presentation was when he said, and I quote, “According to International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) weather data, the rain fell for about 6 hours during which the whole area at the bank of Ogunpa River was flooded….,. in addition to intensive rainfall, the flood was attributed to disregard for town planning rules by developers who erect buildings along canals and drainage channels; and the awful habits of households and enterprises of dumping waste in drainage channels (Momoh, 2011; Sanni, 2011).”

For me, I have always attributed this issue of flooding and bad roads especially in most of our supposed urban areas to. One, our lackadaisical attitude to the construction and the use of drainage channels around our buildings; our penchant for building along disaster prone areas such as flood plains; indiscriminate waste disposal during torrential downpour and low public awareness of existing urban and regional planning laws. Interestingly as a nation, we have a handful of policy documents and laws that ordinarily should form a basis for mitigating the impact of climate change on our immediate environment.

The Nigerian Urban and Regional Planning Act of 2004 is a major example. The law in a nutshell defines and amplifies the need for development plans and development control; it outlines the responsibilities and jurisdictions of federal, state and local governments in the control of development; and in it, a strong case was made for the need to produce a national physical plan for securing integration, consistency and coherence within and between all levels of physical development plans.

The other laws include, the Environmental Impact Assessment Act of 2004 which requires reports and approval for impact of both public and private projects on the environment and establishes cases where impact assessment and reports are required; the National Environmental Standards and Regulation Enforcement Agency Act of 2007 which now replaces the old FEPA Act responsible for protection and sustainable development of the environment and its natural resources; the River Basin Development Authority Act of 2004 which is responsible for the development of water resources, control of flood and erosion; the Federal National Parks Act of 2004 which provides for the establishment of potential areas for resource conservation, water catchment protection, wildlife conservation and the maintenance of national ecosystem balance; the Water Resources Act of 2004 which provides for developing and improving water quality and quantity, pollution prevention plan and regulations, protection of fisheries, flora and fauna.

Sometimes I wonder why we just build the way we do and careless about the grave consequences of our actions. The approval of building designs without adequate provision for greens, parking and proper drainage around such is directly a failure of planning. We spend hundreds of millions to build structures and make little or no provisions for functional drainage systems. And like the saying goes, water will always find its level. If you have observed closely apart from being prone to flooding, communities or streets without proper drainage channels popularly referred to as ‘gutter’ also have bad roads as a result of frequent erosion by un-channeled runoff water anytime there is rain.

I strongly advocate inclusion of drainage system design in building plans as prerequisite for building permits and plan approval by physical planning authorities across the country. There is a need for the adoption of standard drainage channels on a house-to-house basis as a strategy of making neighborhood roads passable and well drained during downpour as a short-term measure before government intervention. The idea here is that at times, especially in our clime, piecemeal approach to immediate planning challenges can be a short term strategy if the comprehensive approach is out of reach.

We need to all agree especially in densely populated urban areas to adopt this street-to-street and house-to-house strategy of constructing standard drainage that have the capacity to effectively carry water during and after rainfall or dam spillage. Every house owner or landlord must be persuade and co-opted to be involved in this approach. Buildings, public, commercial or private must be internally and externally drained. The drains should cover the frontage and sides of buildings especially for corner plots. It is not good enough to think government will come and construct drains in layouts outside of government acquisition. This is one thing we need to do in almost every area especially in cities and towns where flooding is gradually becoming a horrendous.

The need for the enforcement of existing town planning laws is also an important issue that government must push. It is not just enough to make laws; the enforcement aspect should be reinforced and publicized. Locating filling stations, eateries, schools, churches and mosques on canals and drainage channels is wrong. Even the conversion of designated industrial areas for religious and residential use is an anomaly. The privatization and commercialization of green areas and buffers as car parking lots to generate internal revenue is abnormal. Government is the most guilt in this case.

Some people think town planners are insane to have allocated considerable percentage of the land area in all layout designs to greens. Even some people and these include top government officials are not aware that landscaping in planning is not just about planting flowers at every open space in the cities. Landscaping includes maintaining statutory structural setbacks for right-of-way, construction of walkways with functional drainage systems on roads to prevent flooding and erosion.

The bottom line is that government at all levels and the general public should allow qualified town planners to do their job. The Nigerian Urban and Regional Planning Act of 2004 provides for the establishment of a National Urban & Regional Planning Commission at the federal level with the mandate of producing an Operative National Physical Plan (ONPP) with which it will coordinate physical planning in Nigeria.

The Nigerian Urban and Regional Planning Act of 2004 also provides for all states to have what is called, State Urban and Regional Planning Boards. This is aside a functional full fledge Ministry of Urban Planning & Physical Development or Physical Planning as we now have in a few states. These agencies and ministries can only be and must only be under the leadership of registered town planners and members of the Nigerian Institute of Town Planners (NITP). I think it is wrong to bring an Business Administrator, Economist, Lawyer or Medical Doctor to work in a setup designed strictly for those skilled in the art of defining the destiny and identity of cities, including aspects like aesthetics, transportation and even security among others.

At the local government level, the Nigerian Urban and Regional Planning Act of 2004 provides for the establishment of Local Planning Authorities statutorily expected to be in charge of development control at that level. It is sad today that some state governors have transferred the responsibility of local planning authorities to government house. State governors now approve building plans the same way they handle certificates of occupancy. The motive though is to increase internally generated revenue (IGR) at the expense of a sane environment. This however, is a topic for another day.

In the final analysis, while I sympathize with the millions of Nigerians displaced and destabilized by the recent flood in some Nigerian urban areas, including some members of my family, I like to reiterate here that we must all adopt the principle of always consulting qualified and registered town planners before we purchase any plot of land or take development decision within the built environment.

Once again, we have an opportunity for proper physical planning and new town development in the face of the last nationwide flood experience. This should propel government at all levels to make a deliberate attempt at mass social housing development and efficient transportation infrastructure for areas seriously affected by flooding. We have to commission a post-flood impact assessment survey to determine the extent of structural damage done by the flood to existing structures in towns and communities that were submerged during the disaster.

It will be counter-productive on the long haul to ignore town planners in such an exercise. There is also a need for all professionals within the built environment to bond and interact regularly for the development of our nation. Government at all levels must also constructively engage the over five thousand qualified town planners spread across Nigerian cities. The ravaging floods we see in our cities are not just a function of torrential downpour but our disregard for town planning principles and town planners.