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By Enyeribe Ejiogu
When rain fell for the first time this year, there was joy among residents in the Ikotun, Igando, Egbeda, Ejigbo, Obadore, and some other parts of Lagos. The sudden downpour started a little after midnight on Monday, March 10, and lasted for more an hour. It was a welcome development that cooled the air, after prolonged weeks of hot, sweaty nights. For once, generators fell silent as people enjoyed the very breeze for the rest of the night till morning. When the day broke, it was evident that the ground was thoroughly wetted by the rain.
However, for residents of Kupodo-Awoja-Alonge Island, a long-suffering community at the fringe of Iba Local Council Development Area of Ojo Local Government Area, Lagos State, the much vaunted Centre of Excellence, it the rain that fell stirred unpleasant memories.
One side, the community is separated from Obadore in Alimosho Local Government Area by a deep canal that surrounds it. On the other side of the community is Ijagemo, where the Lagos State government is constructing a two-lane asphalt road to link it to the dual-carriage Isheri Road that connects Ijegun and other communities to Jakande Estate and terminating at Jakande Gate on the Oke Afa-Ejigbo-Egbe-Ikotun dual carriage road.
What is significant for the residents of Alonge Island is that the first rainfall signaled the looming restart of their annual months-long lamentation, suffering, loss, life-threatening injuries, and forced relocation, which have been the lot of the people since 2017, when the Sunday Sun began to document their plight.
The aerial picture of Obadore bridge on the Isheri-LASU-Iba dual carriageway and sections of the canal that runs under it, which was taken by a drone shows a thick growth of vegetation that clearly obstructs the free flow of floodwater under the bridge. The picture as well as the video recorded by the drone further show that the canal has been blocked by huge growth of vegetation such that during the rainy season the resulting flood from downpours that pelt the Centre of Excellence, which should normally flow through the canal and empty into the lagoon and outward to the ocean is prevented, leading to the huge floodwater from other places in Alimosho, Ejigbo/Isolo flowing backwards and inundating Alonge Island, flooding the community and forcing several of the residents to flee and relocate.
During a recent visit to the community by Sunday Sun, Chairman of Alonge Awoja Community Association, Iba LCDA, Chief Abayomi Tonade, expressed how he and the other residents feel over the seeming “insensitive and indifferent attitude” of the Lagos State government to their situation.
His words: “It has been 18 or 19 years that I have been here. When I came here, there was nothing like flood or water. We managed one narrow wooden platform built over the canal to come into this community. Then we had major flooding in 2017. When the incident was reported by the Sunday Sun newspaper, former Governor Akinwunmi Ambode was in office. He heard about our problem from newspaper review on television and he sent a team to our community, to investigate. When they came, they went round our community and asked us questions. After that, some engineers from the ministry also came to see the situation and take pictures. Later we sent a delegation to Alausa and we learnt that the governor said he would solve the problem but he did not get second term ticket.
“Since that time he left and Governor Sanwo-Olu took over, we did not hear anything from the government again till this 2025. We have not seen the hand or favour of the government.
“When there is flood, the canal fills up and overflows into our community. The level of the flood used to reach our buttocks when we walk through it to go out of the community. The flood will cover the compounds of our people. Some of these people go to Obadore to rent accommodation or squat with people till the flood reduces.”
A major cause of the problem is that the Chinese contractor that constructed the LASU-Isheri-Iba road blocked part of the space under the bridge during the construction period and left a channel for water to flow. After completing the bridge the contractor did not reopen or widen the channel. Back then there was no flooding in the area, but certain changes in weather, flood control projects as well as the blockage of the canal by huge growth of vegetation have all combined to cause the annual plight that befalls the residents of Alonge Island every year.
Life in Alonge Island
Even in the face of the unfortunate situation of daily life, the residents strive to survive. Through communal efforts, they have built a new and better wooden bridge over a section of the canal that is not as deep as the other points. Incidentally, the new wooden bridge was built at the point where the “road” which is more like a wide path that runs through the centre of the community terminates at the edge of the canal. From that point a community road in Obadore gives the Alonge Island residents access to the LASU-Isheri dual carriage road, off Obadore Junction, enabling them to reach other parts of Lagos in that general axis (Iyana-Oba, Igando, Egbeda, Iyana-Ipaja, Ikeja).
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In addition to opening the blocked space under the Obadore bridge, clearing the canal of heavy growth of vegetation and dredging it, Tonade wants the government to build a concrete bridge over the canal and construct the only earth road in the community done by the residents by manual labour.
On the specific issue of the desired road he gives reasons for the government to favourably consider and grant the appeal: “We want Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu to come to our aid, to build a road for our community. The road that goes through this community links to Ijagemo to Isheri dual carriage that connects to Jakande Estate, Isolo, Mushin, Okota to Mile 2. By constructing a road from Obadore junction to through Community in Obadore to the canal and from there through Alonge Island, the new road will link our community to Ijagemo, Isheri up to Jakande Gate. Already, the government is constructing a road in Ijagemo from the Isheri end.
“By creating this access road through our community, people can pass through here and get to Jakande, Ijegun and continue their journey without having to go Igando, Ikotun to Jakande. Once the government builds this road, there will be an easier way for people.”
The Baale of Kupodo Awoja Alonge Island, Mr Bisiriyu Muka-Adio, while fully agreeing with Tonade added: “We need primary and secondary schools, health centre and police state. I will provide land for school, health centre and police station in the community.
An ex-banker and Pastor in CAC, who is in his early seventies chipped in: “We have enough land. When government builds the concrete bridge, the road and clears the blockage under the Obadore bridge, dredges and clears overgrowth of vegetation blocking the canal and obstructing floodwater, our problem will end. Once there is a road, there will be development. But if there is no road, there will not be development. When this place begins to see rapid development of properties, the government will generate more revenue from collecting land use charge in this community. We are begging the government and pleading to Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu to help us.
We are also tax-paying residents of Lagos, because of our people work in government and private companies, where they pay income tax through their companies. Just as he is building the megacity of Lagos under his THEME+ agenda, we are appealing to him to remember us.
“Last year or late 2023, flooding washed in a crocodile into the community. It took the gallantry of one man to trap and kill the crocodile. Imagine what could have happened to any attacked by the crocodile. We once lost a pregnant woman that went into labour in the middle of the night. Before the people could find a wheel barrow to take her the edge of the canal and be taken across to the Obadore side, she died.
“You see, when we came here, my wife established a branch of her health clinic in this community. But we had to leave this place because of the problem of water. We brought clinic to help the people, incase somebody is sick at night a woman is pregnant and having labour during the night. But because of this flooding problem, the staff had to run. They could not stay. It was scary for them to use the old rickety wooden walkway that resident used to come in and go out of the community.
The health workers were so afraid to use that wooden walkway. And we could not force them to stay, so we closed it. We are praying that when things get better, it will be reopened. That is why we have refise to rent it out.
Six years after Mama Justina Aderenike, a septuagenarian first told expressd her pain over the damage to her home, when it was flooded in 2017, she is still in agony, on account of the fact that the problem the community experienced back than has still not been solved even though the attention of the government has been drawn it more than three times from 2017 to 2025 through feature reports and opinion piece on the “Voices” page of Sunday Sun.
Today, she has been forcefully relocated by her son to a flat he rented for her in Obadore area. Thus happened last year after she fell into the canal and there was no one help her.
Her words: “I have live here for almost 17 years. I built my first house in this community. One day I was coming home and fell into the canal. Thank God I do not have weight. I was shouting for help. Nobosy was around to help me. I was crying and shouting. I managed to reach one plank “standing” in the water. I held it, small, small, I was moving the planks until I came. I called my son. When he came, he said if I had fallen in the deeper part of the canal and was carried by the water, how would he have seen my dead body? He asked his friend to help him search for a house for him nearby. Before I knew it, he rented a house in Obadore, then he came and began packing my things out of my house without even asking me. I did not like to leave the first house I built with my money. He said that if I had died in the canal would I have come to fight for the house. That was how I went out. Because of the flooding and the rickety wooden walkway, my grandchildren did not like to visit me in Alonge Island. They were afraid of the canal. I want to beg the Governor Sanwo-Olu to help us in Alonge Island.”
