Following the tussle on who should control water in Kumbo, which finally saw the putting in place of a team of engineers from CAMWATER and CDE, anger is rife in Kumbo as inhabitants are decrying the brownish water supplied.
Pictures of taps running muddy water and carried in buckets have been trending on social media groups of concerned Kumbo inhabitants as well as Nso people the world over.
In the hundreds of comments that follow the posts which were recently shared by Barrister Joseph Akuwiyadze, the people lament that Kumbo and Nso indigenes are now forced to drink dirty poorly treated water.
One of the people who fought to make sure that Kumbo water was controlled by its indigenes, Stanley Mathew Dzeven, narrated how they stood shoulder to shoulder and fought, seeing their kinsmen cut down by bullets from soldier’s riffles, and how they ran for days when armed and ready-to-kill soldiers were sent after them.
In a pathetic tone, he narrated how late Shufai of Yuwar, who stood next to him, fell by his side, as the late Shufai, in his faint voice while collapsing uttered, “e be like say they dong shoot me”.
With his first-hand experience and narrative, he cautioned his kinsmen to do everything possible to avoid a similar situation that claimed so many lives.
To him, the solution should be by rooting for a peaceful solution. As he says, it was not only a Nso fight, but a fight by all those living in Nso.
One of the comments on Nso Facebook group by Alh Sanda asked if the CAMWATER and CDE engineers “are drinking this water, where did they get their engineering title from?” He concluded that even a primary school pupil knows the quality of good drinking water.
As the people wait to see CAMWATER and CDE engineers pack their gear and leave Kumbo, they say they will take over again and manage their water like they have always done.
In Kumbo, it is feared that, given the quality of water supplied, a cholera outbreak is eminent as many questioned whether it was not suicidal to consume such water.