Principal component analysis and multiple regression models were used to analyze water quality data from four sampling points along the Jakara River in Nigeria. PCA identified five factors explaining 83.1% of the variance in water quality: 1) ionic pollution from salts and minerals, 2) erosion runoff affecting suspended solids and turbidity, 3) domestic pollution shown by biochemical oxygen demand and chemical oxygen demand, 4) dilution affecting temperature and dissolved oxygen, and 5) agricultural runoff containing nitrates and phosphates. Multiple regression identified dissolved oxygen, biochemical oxygen demand, suspended solids, total solids, and chloride as best predicting water quality variation, explaining 94.2% of variability.