The Chika-Ji Rohugi community in Kaduna State on Monday urged the state government to provide residents with infrastructures like roads, electricity and hospital, to enhance their standard of living.

Alhaji Lawal Tanimu, District Head, Chika-Ji community in Igabi Local Government Area of the state, made the plea while addressing newsmen in the area.

According to him, the provision of such facilities will help in reducing some of the health challenges being faced by most pregnant women, while going for ante-natal and other medical checkups.

He said that people in the area were being transported through tipper vehicles and motorcycles because of the bad state of roads in the district.

Tanimu stated that the community, being inhabited by the Hausa-Fulani, Gwari, Adara and other minority tribes, had been existing for decades.

“Farming, cattle breeding, fishing and sand extraction from the river are our main business, while some women are into petty trading to support their families.”

Apart from the bad roads, the community leader identified insecurity and lack of youth empowerment programme as some of the problems facing residents in the area.

He said the poor state of the 20-kilometre road, linking the community to major cities in the state, had hampered the transportation of their farm products to urban centres for sale.

Another resident, Malam Idris Chika-ji, called on the Kaduna State Government to build a primary health care centre in the area, to reduce the problems being faced by women, especially while going for treatment in the city centre.

He described the road as usually bad during the rainy season, to the extent that some women had to abandon going for ante-natal and other medical checkups.

“When the roads are bad during the rainy season, we usually put our pregnant women on our back and take them to the hospital for treatment.

“We also carry the corpses of family members from the city hospitals to the village on commercial motorbikes.

“We need a hospital in this community to save the lives of residents,” Chika-ji said.