As the world marked the 2026 World Water Day, women of Bodo Community in Rivers State are lamenting over increased difficulties being experienced in their lives by over two months of power outage and the resultant water scarcity.
They narrated at a programme organized by Kebetkache Women Development and Research Center, a Port Harcourt based non-governmental organization, that the absence of electricity power supply by PHED has increased their plight.
In emotion-laden voices, the women said a power outage for as long as two months has disorganized their lives, made access to water difficult, as individuals who own boreholes in the community and serve as their main water sources, are now finding the burden of extending access to the public too huge a burden, following daily increasing fuel hikes.
‘They now shut their gates,” making water very difficult to access.
According to the women, many are now forced to source water from neighbouring communities at great cost, man-hour loss and sometimes, exposing them to risks.
One of the women, Madam Grace, stated that she came to the World Water Day program late because she was searching for water to bathe.
She further lamented that even though there is a water facility in the community, the supply is not yet regular.
The general water situation is affecting many things in the community, including the service delivery at the General Hospital.
They appealed to Governor Sim Fubara, the Gokana Local Government Area chairman, to step in to address the power and water problem as water is both life and livelihood.
They also appealed to the management of HYPREP to normalize operations at the Bodo Water Facility to enable easy flow of water in the community.
The women urged their political representatives from local government to state and the National Assembly, to rise to the challenge by bringing Bodo Community matters to the decision-making floor so their needs can be met.
In her opening remarks read out by the Program Manager, Idongesit Smart, the executive director of Kebetkache Women Development and Resource Center, Dr. Emem Okon, stressed that water is of vital importance and that women and girls bear a huge burden when water is not easily accessible.
She noted that about two billion people worldwide lack access to clean water and that, according to the UN, “Women and girls spend over 250 million hours daily collecting water, often losing out on education and income opportunities,” a development she said, adds to inequality in society.
Dr Emem Okon called for gender sensitivity in the design of policies on water and water infrastructure to accommodate women’s interests including affordability.
Keynote speaker and daughter of the community, Dr Stella Armamie highlighted in her presentation, the importance of designing water policies and projects that aim to reduce the peculiar challenges faced by women and girls in accessing water just as she advised women to learn to use water wisely and avoid unnecessary waste .
The women were further advised to protect the rivers, seas and oceans by ensuring that plastics are properly disposed of through re-use, recycling, do…noting that recycling plastics is another way of creating wealth.
The Bodo World Water Day commemoration kicked off with a clean-up exercise at the waterfront by both the Kebetkache team and the community women.
The aim was to teach the women the need to keep the waterfront free from harmful waste like plastics so that the waters and mangroves can breathe, procreate, and help man live in a cleaner environment.
