Agonies of oil communities
Thursday, Nov 15, 2007
Emma Brown, 83, is a nationalist and women’s rights activist.
As a practising journalist up to the 1970s, she had had to fight for the rights of others, never relenting.
But now the Amazon agonises as endowed communities writhe in pain for bearing petroleum which has sustained the national economy for decades.
The oil-rich communities have tales of woe to tell — devastated farmlands, polluted rivers and creeks as well as radiation occasioned by unending gas flaring.
‘’If I were younger, I would have done more; I would be in the front row in the battle to redress the situation, but at more than 80, I am no longer as strong as I used to be.
‘’Mobil started in my father’s house at 48 Liverpool St., Ikot Ebok, Eket, Akwa Ibom, but go there today, the streets adjacent to the house are not even tarred.
“‘It is very disheartening to compare our environment before oil was discovered,” the rights activist agonises.
“We are better of without oil; our economy was based on palm produce
and agricultural activities, our shoreline was lovely for recreation in those days but we have lost all that to oil.’’
Those are the lamentations and regrets of Brown on the risks and hazards of oil exploration activities in her community, Eket.
Nigeria is the world’s sixth largest producer after crude oil was discovered in 1956 by Shell Petroleum and production began in 1958 from the company’s oil field in Oloibiri, Bayelsa.
Figures from the Vienna-based Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) show that Nigeria accounts for 8.2% of the world’s oil output.
The country pumps a daily average of 2.5 million barrels of crude oil to the international market.
Oil sector analysts say government’s current development strategies aimed at increasing production to four million barrels per day by the year 2010 are feasible.
This optimism is anchored on the proven oil reserves underneath the shoreline and offshore.
Though claims of hydrocarbon reserves in Nigeria may vary, OPEC and the Energy Information Administration of the U.S. put the figure at 36.22 billion barrels.
Ntekim Edoho, an oil services operator at Mobil’s Ibeno oil fields, Qua Iboe Terminal, explains that oil reserves are proportionate to the level and technology of prospecting activities.
With more prospecting, additional oil deposits are likely to be found beacuse of the advancement in prospecting technologies.
However, petroleum, which supplies the bulk of the country’s s foreign exchange earnings, has brought with it problems and challenges due to its impact on the environment.
For instance, visits to oil producing communities in the Niger Delta show gross under-development in contrast to claims of corporate social responsibility by the oil companies.
From the creeks in Warri in Delta State, Onne in Rivers to Ibeno in Eket and Oloibiri, the story is not different.
Oil spills are a regular occurrence in these oil fields and the communities complain that even when reports are made, the oil prospecting firms and regulatory agencies respond late.
An oil well in Ikot Ada Udo, Ikot Abasi Local Government Area, Akwa Ibom, belonging to an oil company burst months ago wreaking havoc as gas and crude oil under high pressure gushed out.
The community blamed the company for responding late to the spill.
Chief Emmanuel Akpan, head of the Ikot Ada Udo community, recalls that sources of drinking water and aquatic life were polluted, while the residents fled the area for fear of inhaling gas.
“Of what use will compensation be when people have died due to problems caused by oil spills?
‘’The oil companies are very insensitive to the plight of the community.
‘’We have been crying out for more than three months and nothing has happened at the oil spill site while we continue to live with the hazard.
“This particular oil well has been giving us trouble from 2003 till date; the well has spilled oil for more than five times, which suggests that the repair works were not properly carried out,” Akpan says.
The health, safety and environmental risks of oil exploration activities are real and visible across the landscape and shoreline in the Niger Delta region.
Oil spills, gas flares and the discharge of effluent occur daily with adverse effects on the people and the environment.
The culture of silence in the oil industry, however, played itself out when an oil company’s officials declined to react to claims of neglect, devastated farmlands, polluted streams and delayed response to spills.
To address the problem of neglect in the oil bearing communities, the government, on its part, established Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC).
The funding pattern and administration of the commission may, however, have slowed down the programmes of the commission.
But the severity of the situation in the Niger Delta has compelled the government to fast-rack the region’s development with the adoption of a master plan.
Though oil firms may have contributed largely to the environmental problems in the Niger Delta, the concerned state governments have not helped matters.
Observers say the state governments have nothing to show for the billions of naira accruing to them monthly from the federation account.
Former President Obasanjo, who shares this sentiment, challenged the governors of the region at a forum on the Niger Delta earlier in the year to justify their oil revenue receipts.
On prudent management of oil revenue, Chief Michael Ime, a community leader in Eket, challenges the leaders to invest oil revenue to guarantee regular income for upcoming generations.
This, he says, might be the solution to youth restiveness.
For Sen. Emme Ekaette, Eket Senatorial District, Akwa Ibom, ‘’it is an irony that we are so underdeveloped despite our endowment with natural and human resources.”
Must the communities continue to suffer low school enrolment, high prevalence of HIV due to influx of migrant oil workers, youth restiveness and insecurity?
Added to these are the lack of health care facilities, environmental problems, frequent kidnappings and disruption of oil-related activities resulting in reduced earnings from oil.
Observers have harped on the need to address these challenges in a holistic manner, bringing together all the stakeholders in the oil industry.
The recent release by the federal government of its counterpart funding of the programmes of the NDDC is, therefore, a welcome development.
As the resolution of the Niger Delta crisis is on the seven-point agenda of President Umaru Yar’adua, convening a forum of all ethnic nationalities in the region to discuss these problems is a way out.
Nigeria’s crude streams, Bonny Light and Forcados, are most preferred in the international market because of their low sulphur content.
But disruptions in the oil flow, largely due to youth restiveness in the Niger Delta, have negatively affected oil revenue targets.
Stakeholders believe that it is only by wiping off the tears of the oil bearing communities that the oil companies can resume full-scale oil production and thus shore up the economy.
It is vital for the political, business and community leadership to find an acceptable solution to the problems associated with oil exploration activities in the region.
This three-sided partnership may be the required catalyst needed to take Nigeria’s oil and gas sector to the next level.
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