“Nigeria faces serious environmental challenges, including deforestation, desertification, coastal erosion, flooding, pollution and many other negative impacts of climate change. Lake Chad continues to shrink every year. These issues threaten the livelihoods of millions of Nigerians.”  – His Excellency President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR,

 

In this final instalment in the series of articles on the Lake Chad, it is my intention to urge that all stakeholders should note this dire warning by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu particularly with regards to the Lake Chad and its significance not only for Nigeria, but for the rest of the countries that border the Lake. I especially wish to welcome the convening of the 5th session of the Lake Chad Governors’ Forum in Maiduguri, Borno State, from January 29 to 31, 2025. It is significant that this meeting, which is organised in conjunction with UNDP, brings together important stakeholders like state and provincial governors from the countries bordering the Lake, the LCBC, the African Union and others with the noble intention of saving the Lake.

Its theme being “Rebuilding the Lake Chad Basin”, it is expected that the meeting will consider all aspects of the challenges now besetting the region, and proffering solutions that can be scoped and speedily implemented by the diverse partners and stakeholders based on agreed timelines and methodologies for resource allocation for specific projects and programmes. This is crucial in the sense of moving the expectations of the remediation of the entire Lake Chad Basin as expeditiously as possible, considering that a lot of time has been spent discussing the problems without actual measures so far being taken towards resolving them.

Institutional frameworks and mechanisms already exist across different jurisdictions that could be leveraged to implement agreed decisions. The LCBC is such a critical structure that the Governors’ Forum can avail itself liberally to realise the dreams of rebuilding the Lake Chad Basin. Participants would need to remind themselves that courage and depth of vision more than anything else are required in the execution of these types of projects that seem overwhelming at first, but quite justifiable when considered against the dangers that not doing them would entail.

In the case of Lake Chad, the danger that is anticipated in not taking urgent and robust action is the complete disappearance of that body of water, and the attendant consequences that this would entail for all parties concerned. Mega projects are existential undertakings that are also game changers if properly executed and sustained. They leave a permanent imprint on the sands of time for the initiating leaders. They have long-term, and almost inexhaustible benefits with multiplier effects across spectrums. Some of such benefits can only be realised and reaped by future generations but many can be enjoyed almost immediately.

Water projects like the recharging of Lake Chad may seem costly at first, but they will ultimately pay for themselves and remain profitable for as long as they exist. They are also a panacea to many current and potential problems such as insecurity and inter-communal violence, poverty, desertification, deforestation, land degradation, soil loss, water wastage, food scarcity and hunger, underground water or acquirer depletion, unemployment, drought, climate change, aridity, excessive heat, floods, ecosystem degradation etc. These are some of the dangers that President Tinubu warned about in his statement in Abu Dhabi recently.

Many socioeconomic conditions will also be addressed and resolved by such mega projects if properly executed and sustained. Key questions or challenges like technical and engineering solutions, funding issues, management, jurisdiction and proper domains, ownership of the project, political issues, as well as others relative to the conception, initiation and completion of the project, will have to be discussed and resolved from the outset. These should hopefully fall within the purview of the Governors’ Forum and other relevant partners to effectively address.

Hence it is from these perspectives that the call is made for a renewal of interest in the recharging of Lake Chad to increase the chances of its survival, as well as assure the viability of projects that have been conceived more than 50 years ago to exploit the potentials of the Lake Chad basin, such as the South Chad Irrigation Project (SCIP) and others. It is for these reasons that the series of articles advanced the proposition that while the longstanding inter-basin water transfer (IBWT) schemes from Central Africa to recharge Lake Chad are being considered, possible alternatives should also be looked at, in order to diversify options and remove potential and actual obstacles in the way of the realisation of this existential endeavour.

Two water transfer schemes that have been developed separately by two different groups of engineers are presented here for the consideration of the Governors’ Forum and other appropriate regional and national agencies for possible convergence of opinion on their adoption. This is of course subject to careful contrasting of the proposals with plans already developed for recharging of Lake Chad from rivers in Central Africa, which have been discussed in the earlier instalments in this series.

The KETSWA Proposal to recharge Lake Chad from internal water sources mainly from the River Niger at Lokoja seems feasible and contains a lot of potential benefits. It proposes to divert water to Lake Chad and along the route to bring millions of hectares under cultivation thereby combating aridity and desertification in the upper northern parts of the country and meet the food security needs of Nigeria as a whole. Compelling arguments have been advanced that recommend this proposal for serious consideration.

Some of these include the observation that the project would transfer fresh water to the drier parts of the country to sustain the ecosystem and increase the agricultural outputs of the region. They also include the argument that the root causes of many if not all the problems in the North such as idleness, youth restiveness and unemployment, poverty etc, that have contributed to general insecurity in the region, would be ameliorated by the year-long availability of water for various undertakings throughout the area.

The obvious benefits towards the resuscitation of industries in the North did not escape the proponents of the KETSWA scheme. On the whole, the scheme seeks to transfer some of the waters that flow into the Atlantic Ocean from around or after the confluence of the Rivers Niger and Benue, to where it is needed most with minimum negative effect to the donor environment.

Apart from ultimately recharging Lake Chad, the scheme also provides the opportunity for the development of clusters of economic activities along the entire route of the water transfer. An interaction between the authors and relevant stakeholders will no doubt be profitable and rewarding in ultimately offering a local solution to an endemic problem.

A similar proposal but at a different location was proposed by the engineering group Geosciences & Aku Group, that entails transferring water from the River Benue in Adamawa and other tributaries in Taraba and Bauchi States to recharge Lake Chad through the construction of dams, canals and pipelines along the distance of about 408 kilometers to the shores of the Lake.

The 37-page presentation by Geosciences & Aku Group makes a compelling case for the consideration of the inter-basin water transfer plan from either the Niger or Benue, or both for maximum effect in a short duration of time. My additional proposal is to incorporate the Immega Plan for using solar energy to power the water transfer scheme which replaces the need of building dams across rivers with their attendant environmental and financial consequences.

The Immega plan is feasible, sustainable, renewable and affordable, which makes it a viable option in terms of moving water from any source to the Lake Chad. For the sake of interested partners and stakeholders, the contacts of Engineer Guy Immega, Engineer Hamid M. Al-Sherief of KETSWA and Engineer Asriel Akusa George of Geosciences & Aku Group, can be obtained from the author or the Editor of this newspaper. I also recommend that they should be invited to the Governors’ Forum to present their plans which should be refreshing alternatives to the proposed plan to redirect water from Central Africa that has been on the drawing board since the early part of the 20th century.