Health
Beyond N133bn debate: Accountability crisis hits Gombe water sector
For residents of Gombe metropolis, the water crisis is not a matter of accounting terminology.
It is measured in the early morning queues at boreholes, the cost of buying water from commercial vendors, the search for functioning public taps and the uncertainty over whether water will flow when it is needed.
For more than seven years, the administration of Governor Muhammadu Yahaya has made several interventions aimed at improving water supply across Gombe State.
The government says it has invested heavily in expanding production, rehabilitating ageing infrastructure, improving distribution, providing alternative power and strengthening the institutional framework around water supply.
Yet, despite these interventions, water scarcity remains a recurring reality for many residents.
That contradiction has now triggered a public debate over how much the state has actually committed to the sector, what has been spent, what has merely been appropriated in annual budgets, and whether the scale of investment corresponds with the experience of residents.
At the centre of the controversy is a figure variously put at between N133bn and N138bn.
The figure has been used by critics of the administration as an indication of the enormous resources allegedly committed to water-related projects during Governor Yahaya’s tenure.
The government, however, has rejected the figure as inaccurate and misleading, arguing that it improperly combines different categories of expenditure, including budgetary provisions for water, environment and forestry, recurrent expenditure, development-partner programmes and projects that have not necessarily been paid for.
The disagreement therefore goes beyond whether Gombe has spent a lot of money on water.
It raises a more fundamental question: what exactly should be counted as money spent on water?
And, perhaps more importantly, what should residents reasonably expect from the money that had actually been spent?
N133bn question
The accountability challenge was prominently raised in an open message attributed to a public affairs analyst, Abdullahi Kuri, on August 15, 2026.
Kuri questioned the government’s management of funds allocated to the water sector and asked Governor Yahaya to account for what he described as enormous financial commitments.
“Where is the money allocated for water projects? How much was approved? How much was released? How much was actually spent? Who received the contracts? What has been completed, and what remains unfinished?” he asked.
He specifically referenced the Rehabilitation, Expansion and Upgrade of the Gombe Regional Water Supply Scheme, awarded in March 2022 at approximately N11.491bn to Jidadu Ventures Limited.
But Kuri’s argument was not based solely on that contract.
He contended that when other allocations, contracts, supplementary appropriations, variation orders and related interventions were considered, the financial footprint of government investment in water could reach the widely cited N133bn figure.
His demand was straightforward: if the figure was wrong, government should publish the relevant records and explain the actual amount spent.
“The people of Gombe deserve to know where every naira of public money has gone,” he stated.
Another critic, Comrade Ibrahim Wala, went further in a response dated August 15.
Wala argued that the government’s attempt to distinguish between appropriations and actual expenditure did not resolve the accountability question.
His position was that annual budgets passed by the Gombe State House of Assembly represent legally authorised government spending priorities and should therefore remain subject to public scrutiny.
“Whether categorised as proposed, approved, or revised, the annual budget figures reflect the fiscal intent and priorities of the government,” he argued.
But the government’s response is that fiscal intent and actual expenditure is not the same thing.
That distinction is crucial to understanding the controversy.
‘Appropriation not expenditure’
In a statement titled “Setting the Record Straight: How Governor Inuwa Yahaya is addressing age-long water challenge in Gombe,” the government’s Director-General of Press Affairs, Ismaila Misilli, rejected the N133bn–N138bn claim.
Misilli argued that the figures being circulated combined fundamentally different financial categories.
“For the benefit of the public, it is important to distinguish between recurrent expenditure, inherited liabilities, capital allocations, development-partner programmes, budgetary provisions and actual contract awards,” he stated.
“These are distinct categories and cannot properly be aggregated and presented as though they represent one project or one expenditure.”
That explanation goes to the heart of the dispute.
A government budget can contain billions of naira for a ministry or agency without the entire amount being released or spent. Similarly, a ministry responsible for several sectors can have a large capital allocation without all of that money being intended for water supply.
This appears to be the government’s principal objection to the N133bn figure.
A youth leader in the state, Khalid Kumo, in a separate response dated August 14, explained that the N88.4bn capital provision frequently cited in the debate was not an N88.4bn allocation to urban water supply.
According to Kumo, the figure covers the broader Ministry of Water Resources, Environment and Forest Resources and agencies under it.
He listed allocations including N40bn for the ministry, N150m for Gombe Goes Green, N11bn for GOSEPA, N15bn for the Gombe State Water Board, N12bn for RUWASSA and N8bn for SToWASSA.
The allocation, he argued, also covers environmental and other infrastructure projects, including erosion control measures and the N14.5bn Balanga Dam Hydroelectric Project.
“Therefore, claiming that N88 billion is allocated for water projects in 2026 is both misleading and inaccurate,” Kumo stated.
This is a significant correction because treating an entire multi-sector ministry’s capital budget as expenditure exclusively on water would produce an inflated picture of the resources directly committed to water supply.
However, that does not by itself answer every question raised by critics.
The government still needs to distinguish clearly between what was budgeted, what was contracted, what was released, what was paid and what was physically completed.
Those are different measurements of public investment.
What has actually been acknowledged?
The government’s own account shows that substantial resources have indeed been committed to water-related interventions.
The state says that when the Inuwa Yahaya administration assumed office in 2019, it inherited an outstanding contractual obligation of approximately N5bn to CGC, the company responsible for operating and maintaining the Dadin Kowa facility.
According to Misilli, the administration subsequently spent more than N9.5bn between 2019 and 2025 on inherited obligations, recurrent subventions, chemicals, electricity tariffs, maintenance and other operational requirements.
The government insists that this figure should not be classified as capital investment in new water infrastructure.
Critics, however, view the spending differently.
Wala argues that public expenditure must ultimately be judged by service delivery.
“The government proudly claims it spent over N9.5 billion on recurrent subventions, operational maintenance, chemicals, and electricity tariffs to keep the Dadin Kowa plant running between 2019 and 2025,” he stated.
His question is essentially whether recurrent expenditure can be considered successful if residents continue to experience dry taps.
This presents one of the more difficult aspects of the debate.
Government may legitimately spend money on electricity, chemicals, salaries, maintenance and inherited liabilities without constructing a new pipeline or reservoir. Such expenditure is necessary to keep an existing water system operating.
But residents are equally justified in asking what level of service that expenditure produced.
In other words, a government can accurately say that money was spent, while citizens can simultaneously ask whether the spending delivered value.
Both questions can be valid.
N11.4bn water project
One investment that appears less disputed in terms of its contract value is the Gombe State Regional Water Expansion Project.
The government puts the project value at approximately N11.4bn and says it was implemented under a 70:30 funding arrangement involving the state and the Federal Government.
Jidadu Ventures Nigeria Limited was engaged to execute the project.
According to the government, the project has been completed and is undergoing test-running before being formally transferred to the appointed operator for full operation and maintenance.
The scope, as presented by government, goes well beyond the construction of a single water facility.
At Wuro Juli, the project includes 14 new boreholes, conversion of 14 existing pumps to hybrid systems, a packaged water treatment plant with a capacity of 200 cubic metres per hour, hybrid pumping systems and solar, generator and grid power arrangements.
At the Special Development Zone, the project includes 1,000 cubic metres of surface storage, 500 cubic metres of overhead storage, new pumping infrastructure and hybrid power systems.
At Tunfure, government says additional storage and hybrid pumping infrastructure were provided, alongside a five-kilometre pipeline connection to the NTA Booster Station.
At the NTA Booster Station, the project includes rehabilitation of existing facilities, additional storage, hybrid pumping and power infrastructure and a six-kilometre pipeline extension towards the International Conference Centre.
The project also incorporates network expansion, pressure-control infrastructure, smart metering, water-data management, maintenance equipment, staff training, network mapping and digitisation.
If fully operational, such infrastructure could potentially address several weaknesses simultaneously.
But that is precisely where the public interest shifts from construction to functionality.
A completed water project is important but a functioning water project is more important.
And for residents, the ultimate test is whether water reliably reaches their homes.
Why is power part of the water debate?
One of the government’s strongest arguments is that Gombe’s water problem is not simply a question of pipes and boreholes.
Power is a major part of the equation.
The government says the Dadin Kowa plant has historically faced high energy costs and unstable electricity supply, making water production and pumping expensive and unreliable.
According to Misilli, the government estimates that maintaining production and pumping from Dadin Kowa to Gombe under the previous arrangement could cost more than N500 million monthly.
The administration’s solution has therefore included a transition towards solar and hybrid energy systems.
This is reflected in the new contracts approved in 2026.
The government says approximately N54.66bn in new water and power infrastructure contracts were recently approved.
One component is a N24.26bn contract for the rehabilitation, upgrade and expansion of water supply infrastructure in Malam Inna, Gombe metropolis and the Agro-Livestock Development Zone.
The project is expected to include the rehabilitation of nine existing boreholes, drilling of 11 new boreholes, solar-powered hybrid pumping systems, upgraded treatment and pumping facilities, a 4,000-cubic-metre ground storage tank, additional distribution reservoirs, about three kilometres of transmission pipelines and more than 50 kilometres of distribution pipelines.
Another N7.07bn contract was awarded to Ceylon Construction Services Limited for dedicated power infrastructure at Dadin Kowa and Tabra.
A further N23.33bn has been committed to solar power infrastructure through a contract awarded to Off-Grid Electric Nigeria Limited, according to the government.
These three figures alone total approximately N54.66bn.
The government presents them as evidence that it is tackling the structural causes of water scarcity.
Critics, however, see the timing differently.
Wala asks why major interventions of this magnitude are being undertaken several years into the administration.
“If the Inuwa Yahaya administration understood from its day-one inspection in 2019 that power instability and broken reticulation networks were the root causes of water scarcity, why did it take six full years… to award contracts for solar power and metropolitan reticulation?” he asked.
It is a question that the government could answer most convincingly through a detailed expenditure and implementation timeline showing what was attempted between 2019 and 2025, what worked, what failed and why the current approach became necessary.
Problem of an expanding Gombe
There is another dimension that complicates any assessment of the water crisis: Gombe metropolis itself has changed.
The city’s population has expanded, new settlements have emerged and previously adequate infrastructure has come under increasing pressure.
The government says parts of the existing Malam Inna network have also been affected by urban encroachment, with buildings constructed over sections of pipeline routes.
That means infrastructure designed for an earlier population may no longer be sufficient for the current demand.
The administration argues that replacing and realigning pipelines is therefore not necessarily evidence that previous projects were useless, but a response to changing urban conditions.
This is an important distinction.
Water infrastructure is not static. A growing city needs expanding production, storage and distribution capacity.
But population growth also makes planning and timely investment more important.
If demand has been rising steadily, the relevant accountability question becomes whether government investment has kept pace with that growth.
What about donor-funded programmes?
The debate also involves development-partner interventions, particularly World Bank-supported programmes.
Gombe is among the states participating in the Sustainable Urban and Rural Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene programme and related interventions.
The government says participation in such programmes requires states to meet institutional, planning and budgetary conditions.
These programmes have supported boreholes and other water infrastructure in communities.
But development-partner funding introduces another reason why simply adding every water-related figure together can become misleading.
Some funds may be federal, donor-funded, state counterpart contributions or jointly implemented programmes. Some may pass through agencies rather than directly through the state government’s capital projects.
For an accurate public audit, each intervention needs to be identified by funding source, implementing agency, contract value and actual disbursement.
That would prevent the same project from being counted more than once and would distinguish state expenditure from external development assistance.
What should the government publish?
The controversy may ultimately be resolved not through competing press statements but through documents.
The government’s rejection of the N133bn figure is reasonable if the figure improperly treats an entire multi-sector budget as money spent on water.
But the demand for accountability is also legitimate.
The most useful response would therefore be a consolidated water-sector expenditure statement covering the period from 2019 to 2026.
Such a document could list every major water-related project, showing the project name, location, contractor, date of award, original contract sum, revised contract sum where applicable, amount certified, amount paid, funding source, implementation status and completion date.
It should also distinguish clearly between appropriation, commitment, contract award, release and actual payment.
That would allow citizens to independently understand the numbers.
It would also protect the government from inflated or inaccurate claims.
The Gombe State House of Assembly and the state Auditor-General have constitutional roles in this process.
Critics have invoked Sections 125 and 128 of the 1999 Constitution in arguing for stronger oversight of public expenditure.
The question is therefore not whether citizens should ask questions. They should.
The more important question is whether public institutions are providing sufficient documentary answers.
The real test is the tap
At the centre of this dispute is a simple reality that no accounting classification can erase.
People need water.
Whether the figure is N133bn, N75bn, N54bn, N11.4bn or a substantially lower amount, residents will ultimately judge government by the availability, quality, affordability and reliability of water.
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