Lusama Village Cries Out Over Water Crisis Despite Having 'Son of the Soil' as Water Commissioner.

Lusama Village Cries Out Over Water Crisis Despite Having 'Son of the Soil' as Water Commissioner.

 A deepening water crisis in Lusama village has sparked a wave of frustration and irony across Patigi Local Government Area. Residents of the Kpada I district are living through an acute shortage of potable water, even as their own kinsman, Hon. Usman Yunusa Lade, serves as the Kwara State Commissioner for Water Resources.

The situation in Lusama has shifted from a seasonal inconvenience to a full-blown humanitarian emergency. The village’s primary natural source, a nearby stream, has completely dried up due to the harsh dry season. Compounding the tragedy, the only motorized borehole in the settlement meant to be a lifeline is currently broken and abandoned. The burden falls heaviest on the women and children of Lusama, who now spend hours trekking long distances to fetch water from questionable sources just to sustain their households for cooking and drinking.

The Elephant in the Room: the Commissioner,

The outcry from Lusama carries a sharp sting of irony. For many residents, it is difficult to reconcile the image of a community suffering from thirst with the fact that the person overseeing the entire state's water infrastructure, Hon. Usman Lade, is an indigene of Patigi LGA (specifically from Lade town).

Despite the Commissioner’s official scorecard highlighting "completed" waterworks in neighboring areas like Lafiagi and Zambufu, the rural families in Lusama feel forgotten by the very administration their own son represents.

"It is a painful reality," said a community member who preferred to remain anonymous. "We see the news of water projects elsewhere, but here in the Commissioner's home local government, we are drinking from dried-up pits. We are calling on our brother to look home."

 

the residents have issued a passionate appeal to Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq and Hon. Usman Lade. They are demanding that the state government move beyond press releases and address the physical reality on the ground by:

Immediately repairing the collapsed motorized borehole in Lusama.

Drilling new solar-powered boreholes to provide a sustainable, long-term solution.

Conducting an emergency assessment of rural water needs within Patigi LGA to prevent a waterborne disease outbreak.

The community warns that as the dry season intensifies, the lack of safe water is no longer just a hardship—it is a threat to life.