Oil-producing communities charged on environmental protection

The Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) has raised the alarm over the ecological degradation in the oil-producing areas of the country, urging the people of such communities and other stakeholders to shun unhealthy environmental practices and habits.The Managing Director of the intervention agency, Dr Chris Oboh, who expressed his readiness to tackle the myriads of ecological problems facing the oil producing areas frontally during his tenure, spoke at a workshop organised by the NDDC on environmental awareness in Akure, Ondo State recently.Speaking through the commission's director in the Directorate of Environmental Protection and Control, Mr Ayadi Yalla, the NDDC boss said the issue of environmental protection was a matter of global concern as 'the entire world is at present facing a lot of challenges as far as the environment is concerned.'|Stressing that some of the problems were already threatening the very existence of man on earth, the NDDC boss said 'our Niger Delta region has peculiar and unique environmental challenges which include, but not limited to, indiscriminate waste disposal, oil spills, air pollution, gas flaring, unhealthy occupational practices, flood, sea incursion, among others.'He, however, noted that 'while some of these environmental problems are natural in phenomenon, quite a good number of them are man-made. Even the ones we classify as natural can also be managed by man if he is aware of what to do. This sod invariably put the entire focus of our environment sustainability on man.'The environment is our heritage. We live in it and use its resources like air, land and water to meet our needs. While meeting the ever-growing needs of the people, we also put pressure on the environment to repair and replenish itself.'In his contribution, the Ondo State Commissioner for Environment, Sola Ebiseeni, lamented the peculiar problems of the 80-kilometre stretch of the state's shoreline, describing it as the worst in the country's coastline.He challenged the NDDC to rise up to the challenge of providing potable water for the people of the oil communities in the state, saying that 'the agency should look at alternative way of sourcing water since sinking of boreholes has failed.'Why must we continue to sink boreholes while we can see water face to face' We should explore ways of converting this water to be potable. We are not living as human beings because we drink from the same water we defecate in, this is just too bad.'The workshop drew participants from the two coastal councils of Ilaje and Ese-Odo and a communiqu.
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