The Nigeria Hydrological Service Agency, or NIHSA, claims that state governments have ignored warnings since April 2024 in the wake of devastating floods that have affected states nationwide, and that they will be held accountable for the fatalities and damage to properties that resulted from the events.

The Commissioner for Information and Culture, Alhaji Yakubu Ahmed, revealed last week that Kebbi was the most recent state to experience a flood disaster. The state’s floods claimed at least 30 lives, destroyed over 850 000 acres of farmland used for rice and other crops, and destroyed 326 houses.

Prior to that time, floods had severely damaged and destroyed property in Borno, Adamawa, Yobe, Taraba, Niger, Kano, Jigawa, Kaduna, Bauchi, and Zamfara states, among others.
The states were among those that the NIHSA identified in its April Annual Flood Outlook, or AFO, as being particularly vulnerable to flooding and, as such, were encouraged to prepare by taking preventive action.

Speaking with Sunday Vanguard, Umar Mohammed, the Director General of the NIHSA, stated that while the agency is required to issue flood alerts—which it did in April—and that state governors, among other people, were carried along, it does not supervise or enforce citizen removal.

According to Mohammed, state governments had received warnings and had been advised to take some steps to lessen the impact of floods, such as relocating residents from flood plains and areas where obstructions to streams would prevent water from flowing freely.

He declared: “NIHSA is essentially responsible for alerting Nigerians about rising water levels at any given moment.”

Therefore, we typically notify state governors so that they implement safety measures to protect citizens from flooding and those who reside or conduct business near a specific river.

Living on flood plains and developing on waterways are extremely risky decisions that ultimately have a terrible impact on people.

Governors are urged to evacuate their people to camps when we warn them to the situation and submit our AFO to them, especially in states that are prone to flooding. In exchange, the governors are expected to take the necessary action to relocate their people.

Therefore, state governments are the only ones who have the authority to relocate people in relation to flood issues. As a federal agency, we do not undertake any relocations ourselves; instead, we provide state governments with the necessary guidance and resources to lessen the effects of flood disasters.

When flooding is at its worst, state governments should mandate that their citizens take time off and relocate.
Therefore, state governments—not us—should bear responsibility for any flood disasters that affect people because we have instructed them to evacuate their citizens, clear their drainage systems, work with town planners to remove buildings that obstruct waterways, raise public awareness of the need to avoid areas that flood, and take other steps to significantly reduce the effects of flooding on their citizens.

The head of NIHSA commented on the water release from Lagdo Dam, saying, “They start with 1,000 cubic meters after seven days of systematic release of 100,000 cubic meters of water.”