The Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) says it will proffer immediate solution to the recent landslide that occurred in Tuomo Community, Burutu Local Government Area of Delta.
Mr Ogaga Ifowodo, the Commissioner, Warri Office of NDDC, made the assertion on Wednesday in Warri when he led a delegation on an inspection visit to the site.
A portion of the shoreline protection project in Tuomo Community collapsed on March 18 due to landslide, but no life or property was lost to the incident.
Ifowodo said that immediate solution was necessary to protect those houses that were already endangered, while waiting for the long lasting solution.
According to him, the long lasting solution may involve the conduct of a deep soil investigation to understand the soil formation and quality of the underlying layers of soil.
“The first step now is to look for immediate solution to protect those houses that are really endangered by the landslide.
“A more lasting solution is to look for the root cause of the problem, because failure have happened in two places along the shoreline.
“So, we need to identify what is responsible for the failure; we may need to do deep soil investigation to understand the soil formation.
“How soon, I cannot say for now, because we are just coming from inspection. We need to get back to the office and do our report,’’ he said.
Ifowodo said that the commission had two projects- shoreline protection and concrete pavement along that shoreline.
He said: “We don’t want both projects to be endangered.
“If we do not take immediate step, we are also exposing ourselves to greater cost of finally remediating the situation because a stitch in time saves nine.”
Ifowodo appealed to people of the affected community to be patient as urgent step would be taken to address the situation.
Also, Mr Dada Bamidele, the Civil/Operations Manager of Vibroflotation and Geotechnical Nigeria Ltd., said that contracting firm had described the project as an engineering challenge that require engineering solution.
“Landslide is a natural phenomenon; there are some geographical formation within the soil that may not be obvious within the surface that is responsible for the disaster.
“No one pray for this kind of a thing, if you do a job anywhere, you will be glad to see your work stand overtime and serve its purpose,” Bamidele said.
He urged the community to be more cooperative to ensure that whatever solution proposed would be beneficial to all of them.
An opinion leader in Tuomo Community, Mr Ebikoro Tabekaemi, blamed the situation on poor job done by the contractor.
“The other portion of the project failed about two years ago and now this place, the contractor is not serious with the job, that is the truth,” he said. (NAN)
