Exactly one year ago, the Stakeholders Alliance for Corporate Accountability (SACA) organized an action-reflection event, hosting community gatekeepers from 20 communities in Bayelsa State. The event reinforced participants’ knowledge of the harmful effects of crude oil spills on their environment and health. It prompted them to take non-violent actions against the high rate of crude oil spills in and around their communities. The event was attended by 39 males and 2 females from rural communities.
On Thursday, June 13, 2024, SACA held another action reflection session on the same theme with the rural women only. Presentations on the negative effects of oil spillages on human health and the environment focused on children, adult males, adult females and expectant mothers; environmental sustainability (ecosystem and biodiversity); food security and food safety; Business and Human Rights; and how communities can work with the Nigerian Security and Civil Defense Corps to protect their environment from further pollution.
SACA’s partners who anchored presentations are the Bayelsa State Ministry of Health, the Bayelsa State Ministry of Environment, the Bayelsa State Ministry of Agriculture, the National Human Rights Commission, and the National Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC). Dr. Briggs E. from the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital also graced the event with an astounding presentation. All presenters used real-life incidents – short documentaries, pictures and audio that speak to the issues of crude oil pollution to steer interest and deepen understanding.
During plenary sessions, participants shared experiences about the menace they suffered from high exposure to crude oil spills. One participant from one of the communities represented narrated her struggles birthing a child with disabilities, citing that this could have been a result of direct or indirect contact with crude oil-contaminated water sources for drinking and fishing, and proximity to the spill locations. Another had a stillbirth, and many said the spill depopulated fishes in their rivers and caused some indigenous species to go extinct, and most said it polluted their drinking water sources and made them unsafe. They also reported that crude oil spills reduced the productivity of a species of cocoyam locally called “mama coco” in Bayelsa State.
To reduce the spate of crude oil spillages in communities, particularly those arising from wilful damage of crude oil facilities, oil theft and illegal refining of crude oil, women resolved to unite and carry out peaceful protests in their respective communities. SACA shall provide media coverage to them to amply their voices.
In Bayelsa State, the sensitization program in rural communities will end in August 2024. Despite this, the Executive Director of SACA, Mr. Kingsley Ozegbe pledged continued support to the oil spill-affected communities to ensure drastic reduction of further spillages into the environment.
Key dignitaries that attended the event include the Bayelsa State Director of Petroleum and Pollution, Engr. Enai Reuben; Bayelsa State Assistant Director of Petroleum and Pollution; the Bayelsa State Director of Public Health, Dr Stow Jones; the Bayelsa State Director of Agric Services, Mrs. Sarah Udisi; the Bayelsa State Coordinator of the National Human Rights Commission, Dr Eugen Baadom; the Bayelsa State Head of Legal of the National Human Rights Commission, Barr. Nimnan Vining Gossele; the Head of Critical National Assets and Infrastructure in Bayelsa State Command, Nigerian Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC), Deputy Commandant Emmanuel Nwachukwu, the NSCDC Bayelsa State Command PPRO, Deputy Superintendent Diri-Ogbere Solomon; the Bayelsa State Director of Primary Schools, Ms. Powei Otrofanowei, represented by the Chief Education Officer of Primary Schools, Mrs Ene Eluanatein; and the Bayelsa State Deputy Director of Secondary Schools, Akunna Oweilayefa represented by the Chief Education Officer, Secondary Schools, Bolobolo David amongst others.
We thank Misean Cara Mission Support from Ireland, and the St. Patrick’s Missionary Society for supporting the event. We also thank all our partners for their cooperation and commitment to this cause.