The National Water Resources Bill currently before the National Assembly, has been beset by controversies by persons who do so for selfish and political reasons, says water resources minister Suleiman Adamu.

The minister said misinformation on the bill was deliberately being sent out to frustrate the bill.

President Muhammadu Buhari in July asked the National Assembly to quickly pass the bill which has generated much controversy.

Opponents argue that the bill seeks to hand the control of all water resources in Nigeria to the federal government amid calls for decentralisation of federal authority.

The bill also proposes a mandatory licence for citizens wishing to drill boreholes in their homes, a move that worsen availability of potable water that the government has failed woefully to provide.

However, the minister declared that the federal government has taken a firm decision to regulate the water delivery system, as no data exists to effectively reform the sector.

Mr Adamu, at a ministerial briefing organised by presidential communications team in Abuja on Thursday, said: “Obviously, I have said so much about this bill, people have been deliberately misinformed.

“The bill was deliberately politicised unnecessarily, something that is good for the development of the country. And in any case, 96, 97 percent of the provisions in that bill already exist in four different laws – Water Resources Act 2004, Nigeria Hydrological Services Act, River Basin Development Authorities Act, and the National Water Resources Institute Act.

“We are still working with the National Assembly on this bill. I think probably they were so engrossed with the PIB and the electoral bill, which are of course, serious national priorities, and they were not able to come to talk about it.

“But already, we have done all the things that needed to be done. The issue that was raised, the technical issue about gazetting had been addressed.

“So the bill is still before the National Assembly.’’

The bill had already been rejected twice at the National Assembly in 2018 and 2020, yet Mr Buhari re-presented it.

(NAN)