Feature/OPED
Deconstructing the Reintroduced National Water Resources Bill
By Jerome-Mario Chijioke Utomi
There is no doubt anymore that in Nigeria’s leadership corridor, once a direction is chosen, instead of examining the process meticulously and setting the right course; one that will allow us to overcome storm and reach safety before we can progress and achieve our goals, we obstinately persist with the execution of such plans regardless of a minor or major shift in circumstance.
An eloquent example of the above assertion is the controversial water resources bill recently reintroduced in the House of Representatives and sponsored by the Chairman of the House Committee on Water Resources, Sada Soli (APC, Katsina).
The bill, which was first introduced in the 8th Assembly, caused outrage then as some Nigerians interpreted the proposed law as a power grab by the federal government.
Aside from this federal government’s habit of tackling challenges with the same thinking used when it was created and, “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result,” what is uncertain to the vast majority of Nigerians and of course, the watching world, is; why this sudden move after two previous failed attempts? What has changed to necessitate the present re-introduction? Whose interest is the bill, if passed, meant to serve/protect? And most importantly, whether it will herald into our political geography a just or an unjust law?
As we are now, a just law is ‘a man-made code that squares with moral laws or the laws and uplifts human personalities, while an unjust law on the other hand is a code that is out of harmony with moral laws.’
Adding context to this discourse, the Bill which first emanated from the Executive arm and, among other things seeks: to establish a regulatory framework for the water resources sector in Nigeria, provide for the equitable and sustainable development management, use and conservation of Nigeria’s surface water, groundwater resources and for related matters.’ Arguably noble but following the controversy and worries already raised, it becomes a moral duty for all to collectively and objectively takes a disciplined look at it in order to –adjust, adapt, incorporate or otherwise.
Essentially, the most telling evidence about the bill’s good intention is signposted in the federal government’s resolve to promote judicious management of the nation’s water resources in addition to the possibility of the bill if passed, acting as an enabler to the nation’s attainment/achievement of the orchestrated Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as preached by the United Nations (UN). But somewhere along the line lies a set of inherent challenges/consequences arising from its nature, impact, and strategy- a feat that has since mirrored the entire document (bill) as a body without a soul.
Going by the content of the bill, it is easy to situate that the greatest ill associated with it lies in its tendency to disenfranchise, and separate Nigerians from ancestral ownership of their water rights and handover the same to a set of federal technocrats by confusing Nigerians with the fallacy that “ownership rights to water is the same as water use rights.”
Also working against the bill is the accompanying belief by Nigerians with critical interest that the urge to have the bill passed is driven not by love for having the nation’s water resources judiciously managed or for the nation to develop agriculturally as claimed by the lawmakers, but by sectional and parochial interests such that some pro bill senators are using barefaced inaccuracies to mislead the Senate and drum up support for the bill.
For example, during the time of the 8th Assembly when the bill was first introduced, it has been claimed on the floor of the Senate that the World Bank is waiting on passage of the bill into law to “grant” trillions of naira to develop Nigeria’s irrigation infrastructure. This cannot be further from the truth. The World Bank would never and cannot ask a nation to deprive its citizens of their inherited and cultural rights to water as a condition for granting loans. Another obstacle that confirms the bill as plagued, however, seems not to raise so much dust but could be costly in economic and political terms if ignored, is the asymmetrical support structure given to the bill. It is barefaced that virtually all the senators that queued behind the bill were from water-poor states and regions that stand to gain from the passage of the bill when passed.
Interpretatively, this lopsided support given to the bill from inception, looking at commentaries was fuelled not by the burning desire for the public good but for sectional gain. Glaringly as it stands, this trend no doubt has become a pernicious problem embedded in our administrative culture that will be too difficult to eradicate. And has also necessitated the question as to how the nation can redistribute lands from land-rich states to land-poor states since the bill if passed as it is without amendment could conceivably make inter-basin transfers of water to be undertaken by the federal government without consent from or even consultation from indigenous communities…exactly like crude oil and associated problems of mean, wicked and evil inequities.
The bill, in the writer’s view, has justified the fears by Nigerians with discerning minds that the federal government by this move to acquire more power may not be interested in the devolution of power as currently demanded by Nigerians or may be paying lip service to the imperativeness and urgency of having this country restructured.
Accordingly, the whole argument by the FG becomes even vaguer, variable and ungraspable when one remembers that some of these items will be better handled and serves the greater good to the greater number of the people if left in the hands of the state, the local government or private owners.
From what Nigerians are saying, what has caused serious concern is that the bill viewed from a wider spectrum stands as telling proof of the present administration’s insensitivity to the people of the Niger Delta and other water areas.
These fears expressed by the coastal dwellers cannot be described as unfounded as it was a similar Decree 101 of 1992 which is now incongruously dressed up as an act of the National Assembly (Water Resources Act Cap W2 LFN 2OO4) that robbed every Nigerian of their water rights as it was hurriedly signed into law by the then military Ibrahim Babangida as his parting gift to Nigerians.
Lamentably, this and other sordid laws from the federal government in the past have particularly left the Niger Delta/coastal regions in social difficulties with no good record for survival as their environment is daily devastated/destroyed, with their teaming youths unemployed while the communities are periodically dispersed by the flood.
To put it differently, environmental experts and development practitioners are particularly not happy that the federal government proposed such a bill in the face of an endless list of actions not taken to better the lots of the people.
In case after case, the federal government has become reputed for pursuing policies chosen in advance of facts, policies designed to benefit some sections of the country- making global watchers conclude that there is something troubling in this administration. With these facts in mind, it is the writer’s view that our nation is in the process of quietly making what future historians will certainly describe as a disastrously mistaken decision on the issue of the National Water Resources Bill.
Allowing this bill signed into law, will not just usher in an unjust law but set the table to truncate the nascent peace currently enjoyed in the region while ushering in another round of hostility as the people are committed to peace by any means necessary but may not be committed to becoming the victims of peace.
To succeed in this assignment, the federal government must be holistic in its approach and practice deliberative democracy. This, in the writer’s view, will entail halting the ongoing debate on the National Water Resources bill in order to pave way for other stakeholders such as civil society groups, Water experts as well as the southern states to fully make their inputs- submit memoranda and possibly given the opportunity to make a presentation as it relates to this bill.
And at a broader perspective, the government must desist from the current non-participatory approach to development and embrace a broad-based consultative approach that will give the people some sense of ownership over their own issues.
Utomi is the Programme Coordinator (Media and Public Policy), Social and Economic Justice Advocacy (SEJA), Lagos. He can be reached via je*********@***oo.com/08032725374
Nigeria is entering a timing-sensitive macro set-up as the oil complex reprices disruption risk and the US dollar firms. Brent moved violently this week, settling at $77.74 on 02 March, up 6.68% on the day, after trading as high as $82.37 before settling around $78.07 on 3 March. For Nigeria, the immediate hook is the overlap with domestic policy: the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has just cut its Monetary Policy Rate (MPR) by 50 basis points to 26.50%, whilst headline inflation is still 15.10% year on year in January.
“Investors often talk about Nigeria as an oil story, but the market response is frequently a timing story,” said David Barrett, Chief Executive Officer, EBC Financial Group (UK) Ltd. “When the pass-through clock runs ahead of the policy clock, inflation risk, and United States Dollar (USD) demand can show up before any oil benefit is felt in day-to-day liquidity.”
Policy and Pricing Regime Shift: One Shock, Different Clocks
EBC Financial Group (“EBC”) frames Nigeria’s current set-up as “policy-lag arbitrage”: the same external energy shock can hit domestic costs, FX liquidity, and monetary transmission on different timelines. A risk premium that begins in crude can quickly show up in delivered costs through freight and insurance, and EBC notes that downstream pressure has been visible in refined markets, with jet fuel and diesel cash premiums hitting multi-year highs.
Market Impact: Oil Support is Conditional, Pass-through is Not
EBC points out that higher crude is not automatically supportive of the naira in the short run because “oil buffer” depends on how quickly external receipts translate into market-clearing USD liquidity. Recent price action illustrates the sensitivity: the naira was quoted at 1,344 per dollar on the official market on 19 February, compared with 1,357 a week earlier, whilst street trading was cited around 1,385.
At the same time, Nigeria’s inflation channel can move quickly even during disinflation: headline inflation eased to 15.10% in January from 15.15% in December, and food inflation slowed to 8.89% from 10.84%, but energy-led transport and logistics costs can reintroduce pressure if the risk premium persists. EBC also points to a broader Nigeria-specific reality: the economy grew 4.07% year on year in 4Q25, with the oil sector expanding 6.79% and non-oil 3.99%, whilst average daily oil production slipped to 1.58 million bpd from 1.64 million bpd in 3Q25. That mix supports external-balance potential, but it also underscores why the domestic liquidity benefit can arrive with a lag.
Nigeria’s Buffer Looks Stronger, but It Does Not Eliminate Sequencing Risk
EBC sees that near-term external resilience is improving. The CBN Governor said gross external reserves rose to USD 50.45 billion as of 16 February 2026, equivalent to 9.68 months of import cover for goods and services. Even so, EBC views the market’s focus as pragmatic: in a risk-off tape, investors tend to price the order of transmission, not the eventual balance-of-payments benefit.
In the near term, EBC expects attention to rotate to scheduled energy and policy signposts that can confirm whether the current repricing is a short, violent adjustment or a more durable regime shift, including the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) Short-Term Energy Outlook (10 March 2026), OPEC’s Monthly Oil Market Report (11 March 2026), and the U.S. Federal Reserve meeting (17 to 18 March 2026). On the domestic calendar, the CBN’s published schedule points to the next Monetary Policy Committee meeting on 19 to 20 May 2026.
Risk Frame: The Market Prices the Lag, Not the Headline
EBC cautions that outcomes are asymmetric. A rapid de-escalation could compress the crude risk premium quickly, but once freight, insurance, and hedging behaviour adjust, second-round effects can linger through inflation uncertainty and a more persistent USD bid.
“Oil can act as a shock absorber for Nigeria, but only when the liquidity channel is working,” Barrett added. “If USD conditions tighten first and domestic pass-through accelerates, the market prices the lag, not the headline oil price.”
Brent remains an anchor instrument for tracking this timing risk because it links energy-led inflation expectations, USD liquidity, and emerging-market risk appetite in one market. EBC Commodities offering provides access to Brent Crude Spot (XBRUSD) via its trading platform for following energy-driven macro volatility through a single instrument.
By Emma Kendrick Cox
This year, the eldest Gen Alpha turns 16.
That means they aren’t just the future of our work anymore. They are officially calling for a seat at the table, and they’ve brought their own chairs. And if you’re still calling this generation born between 2010 and 2025 the iPad generation, then I hate to break it to you, but you’re already obsolete. To the uninitiated, they look like a screen-addicted mystery. To those of us paying attention, they are the most sophisticated, commercially potent, and culturally fluent architects Africa has ever seen.
Why? Because Alphas were not born alongside the internet. They were born inside it. And by 2030, Africa will be home to one in every three Gen Alphas on the planet.
QWERTY the Dinosaur
We are witnessing the rise of a generation that writes via Siri and speech-to-text before they can even hold a pencil. With 63% of these kids navigating smartphones by age five, they don’t see a QWERTY keyboard as a tool. They see it as a speed bump, the long route, an inefficient use of their bandwidth. They don’t need to learn how to use tech because they were born with the ability to command their entire environment with a voice note or a swipe.
They are platform agnostic by instinct. They don’t see boundaries between devices. They’ll migrate from an Android phone to a Smart TV to an iPhone without breaking their stride. To them, the hardware is invisible…it’s the experience that matters.
They recognise brand identities long before they know the alphabet. I share a home with a peak Gen Alpha, age six and a half (don’t I dare forget that half). When she hears the ding-ding-ding-ding-ding of South Africa’s largest bank, Capitec’s POS machine, she calls it out instantly: “Mum! Someone just paid with Capitec!” It suddenly gives a whole new meaning to the theory of brand recall, in a case like this, extending it into a mental map of the financial world drawn long before Grade 2.
And it ultimately lands on this: This generation doesn’t want to just view your brand from behind a glass screen. They want to touch it, hear it, inhabit it, and remix it. If they can’t live inside your world, you’re literally just static.
The Uno Reverse card
Unlike any generation we’ve seen to date, households from Lagos to Joburg and beyond now see Alphas hold the ultimate Uno Reverse card on purchasing power. With 80% of parents admitting their kids dictate what the family buys, these Alphas are the unofficial CTOs and Procurement Officers of the home:
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The hardware veto: Parents pay the bill, but Alphas pick the ISP based on Roblox latency and YouTube 4K buffers.
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The Urban/Rural bridge: In the cities, they’re barking orders at Alexa. In rural areas, they are the ones translating tech for their families and narrowing the digital divide from the inside out.
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The death of passive: I’ll fall on my sword when I say that with this generation, the word consumer is dead. It implies they just sit there and take what you give them, when, on the contrary, it is the total opposite. Alphas are Architectural. They are not going to buy your product unless they can co-author the experience from end to end.
As this generation creeps closer and closer to our bullseye, the team here at Irvine Partners has stopped looking at Gen Alpha as a demographic and started seeing them as the new infrastructure of the African market. They are mega-precise, fast, and surgically informed.
Believe me when I say they’ve already moved into your industry and started knocking down the walls. The only question is: are you building something they actually want to live in, or are you just a FaceTime call they are about to decline?
Pay attention. Big moves are coming. The architects are here.
Emma Kendrick Cox is an Executive Creative Director at Irvine Partners
By Kehinde Ogundare
For years, security for SMEs across sub-Saharan Africa meant metal grilles and alarm systems. Today, the most significant risks are invisible and growing faster than most businesses realise.
Artificial Intelligence has quietly embedded itself into everyday operations. The chatbot responding to customers at midnight, the system forecasting inventory requirements, and the software identifying unusual transactions are no longer experimental technologies. They are becoming standard features of modern business tools.
Last month’s observance of Safer Internet Day on February 10, themed ‘Smart tech, safe choices’, marked a pivotal moment. As AI adoption accelerates, the conversation must shift from whether businesses should use AI to how they deploy it responsibly. For SMEs across Africa, digital trust is no longer a technical consideration. It is a strategic business imperative.
The evolving threat landscape
Cybersecurity threats facing sub-Saharan African SMEs have moved well beyond basic phishing emails. Globally, cybercrime costs are projected to reach $10.5 trillion this year, fuelled by generative AI and increasingly sophisticated social engineering techniques. Ransomware attacks now paralyse entire operations, while other threats quietly extract sensitive customer data over extended periods.
The regional impact is equally significant. More than 70% of South African SMEs report experiencing at least one attempted cyberattack, and Nigeria faces an average of 3,759 cyberattacks per week on its businesses. Kenya recorded 2.54 billion cyber threat incidents in the first quarter of 2025 alone, whilst Africa loses approximately 10% of its GDP to cyberattacks annually.
The hidden risk of fragmentation
A common but often overlooked vulnerability lies in digital fragmentation.
In the early stages of growth, SMEs understandably prioritise affordability and agility. Over time, this can result in a patchwork of disconnected applications, each with separate logins, security standards, and privacy policies. What begins as flexibility can involve operational complexity.
According to IBM Security’s Cost of a Data Breach Report, companies with highly fragmented security environments experienced average breach costs of $4.88 million in 2024.
Fragmented systems create blind spots; each additional data transfer between applications increases exposure. Inconsistent security protocols make governance harder to enforce. Limited visibility reduces the ability to detect anomalies early. In practical terms, complexity increases risk.
Privacy-first AI as a competitive differentiator
As AI capabilities become embedded in business software, SMEs face a choice about how they approach these powerful tools. The risks are not merely theoretical.
Consumers across Africa are becoming more aware of data rights and are willing to walk away from businesses that cannot demonstrate trustworthiness. According to KPMG’s Trust in AI report, approximately 70% of adults do not trust companies to use AI responsibly, and 81% expect misuse. Meanwhile, studies also show that 71% of consumers would stop doing business with a company that mishandles information.
Trust, once lost, is difficult to rebuild. In the digital age, a single data leak can destroy a reputation that took ten years to build. When customers share their payment details or purchase history, they extend trust. How you handle that trust, particularly when AI processes their data, determines whether they return or take their business elsewhere.
Privacy-first, responsible AI design means building intelligence into business systems with data protection, transparency and ethical use embedded from the outset. It involves collecting only necessary information, storing it securely, being transparent about how AI makes decisions, and ensuring algorithms work without compromising customer privacy. For SMEs, this might mean choosing inventory software where predictive AI runs on your own data without sending it externally, or customer service platforms that analyse patterns without exposing individual records. When AI is built responsibly into unified platforms, it becomes a competitive advantage: you gain operational efficiency whilst demonstrating that customer data is protected, not exploited.
Unified platforms and operational resilience
The solution lies in rethinking digital infrastructure. Rather than accumulating disparate tools, businesses need unified platforms that integrate core functions whilst maintaining consistent security protocols.
A unified approach means choosing cloud-based platforms where functions share common security standards, and data flows seamlessly. For a manufacturing SME, this means inventory management, order processing and financial reporting operate within a single security framework.
When everything operates cohesively, security gaps diminish, and the attack surface shrinks. And the benefits extend beyond risk reduction: employees spend less time on administrative friction, customer data stays consistent, and platforms enable secure collaboration without traditional infrastructure costs.
Safer Internet Day reminds us that the digital world requires active stewardship. For SMEs across the African continent who are navigating complex threats whilst harnessing AI’s potential, digital trust is foundational to sustainable growth. Security, privacy and responsible AI are essential characteristics of any technology infrastructure worth building upon. Businesses that embrace unified, privacy-first platforms will be more resilient against cyber threats and better positioned to earn and maintain trust. In a market where trust is currency, that advantage is everything.
Kehinde Ogundare is the Country Head for Zoho Nigeria
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