Eteo community cries out over absence of report, 11 months after oil spill

By Obiabin Onukwugha

Eleven months after an oil spill occured at Oke-Olebo Stream in Eteo community, Eleme local government of Rivers State, residents of the community have lamented the failure of federal government relevant agencies and the Nigeria National Oil Corporation Ltd, NNPCL, to carry out remediation steps.

The oil spill was reported from one of the pipelines transporting crude and operated by the NNPCL on June 13, 2023. The spill was said to be noticed by a fisherman who alerted the community.

The spill contaminated water sources and affected the livelihoods of the people.

Community sources told NatureNews, that despite several letters written to relevant authorities, including the Federal and State Houses of Assembly, both the NNPCL and NODSRA have failed to either publish the report of what they claimed in Joint Investigative Visit (JIV), clean up the affected area, or pay compensations to the people.

Eteo community had earlier suffered an oil spill in 2018 which the community is currently seeking justice at the Supreme Court against Shell. Another oil spill was also recorded in November 2022, before the latest in June of last year

In an interview with NatureNews correspondent, a stakeholder in Eteo community, Gabriel Ollornwi, said the people have lost their natural livelihood since the commencement of oil operations.

He said, the stream was the community’s source of drinking water before it was contaminated by the spill. He further lamented that fishing activities have also been affected by the spill.

Gabriel said: “The oil spill in Eteo dates back June 13, 2023. We woke up and one of our brothers who is a fisherman raised alarm that he went for fishing and he saw some black things on the water so we ordered our youths to go and check and we discovered that it was spill from an old pipe run by NNPCL. The pipe they laid in1960 which they refused to maintain or overhaul that burst and caused a lot of spill, destroying farmlands, destroying our fishing places, destroyed a lot of organisms.

“Then we wrote to NOSDRA, we wrote to House of Reps, we wrote to House of Assembly, only overnight we heard that the NNPC came and sealed back the place.

“No JIV has been carried out because it implies that the owners of the facility must be there, government must be there and community must be there. We have not seen that. I don’t know what they did. They came one day from NOSDRA they said they want to do investigation. We entered into the deep water and everywhere is covered with crude oil. The oil is still there. They call it joint investigation, I don’t know the details. But if it is really joint investigation, where is the result?

“Right now most of our women who go to fishing and they train their children by fishing have lost it. All the fishing nets lost, all the farmlands within that area lost. Some persons who fetch the water to drink can no longer go to the river, they have resorted to buying water from someone we has a deep borehole in the community. The man used to sell a bucket of water for twenty naira but has now raised it to seventy naira.

“You can’t breath well. If you sleep in this community for one night then you will see what I’m telling you. You will know that what you are breathing is chemical. The air is Polluted.

“This community, our mothers went to farm, harvest their cassava and take it to the river to soak and in three to seven days you go and wash it and you eat “fufu”. Most of my friends outside Eteo will say, we will come to eat your “fufu oo” because there was nothing like benzine, nothing like any odour or chemical, it is naturally fermented by the fishes and nature.

“But what our women do now is, since you must eat fufu, they now soak it in containers in the house. This is the condition we have found ourselves.

“If you take a survey around this community you cannot see anything like pawpaw, you cannot see anything orange. The durability of zincs we used to roof our houses is short. We roof our house and within one year the roof is rotting because of the activities of exploiters.

“They don’t show any concern because they have their guns, they don’t show any concern because they have the money, they don’t show any concern because they are using the tactics of divide and rule.

“Our forefathers were denied of their rights, they took so many lands from them and since then the pipes have been lying as old as it is to this day.

“We are calling on the government to come and do a proper clean up. Restore the stream to its former state, bring out the result of the JIV so that our people can live well.”

Reacting to the development, environmental bodies have condemned the negligence of the NNPCL and relevant agencies on the plights of the Eteo community.

Speaking with NatureNews, Programme Manager of Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF), Stephen Oduware, demanded that the result of the JIV be made public. He also condemned the failure of the company to reach out to the community since the incident occured last year.

He said: “You will recall that in June 13, 2023 there was a spill that happened along a pipeline operated by NNPC carrying crude and it spilled into their environment, degrading their water, farmlands and livelihoods.

“Let’s put it on record that I think that NODSRA and all other government regulatory agencies have not done well by not carrying out a joint investigative visit to find out what actually happened.

“If they say they have done that JIV, I dare them to produce the report. A spill that happened close to a year now and nothing has been done.

“Community people have been abandoned, farmlands degraded, their source of drinking water which is the stream destroyed, and the community is crying out for justice and we think that this is the time to stand with them to ensure that justice is served and that their farmlands and water is restored and also, compensation are paid to the affected people for their loss.

“We know that compensations can never be enough because you can’t really quantify the amount of biodiversity that is lost or the land that is lost but let them ensure that due compensations are paid.”

On his part, the Coordinator, Oilwatch International, Kentebe Ebiaridor, said: “As at June 13 last year, the oil spill was reported and efforts by community people over this period have yielded little or no response from NODSRA, from Ministry of environment and from NNPC. Also, they have gone as far as the state assembly but they have little or no responses.

“And for us, we think that it is a very sad situation because if the State-owned NNPC cannot respond immediately to claims of community people, then it’s something that we need to actually look at and understand in the wake of the current divestment that is currently going on.

“Because if we cannot hold our own local people accountable for atrocities and destruction they cause on the environment in local communities then it will be difficult for us to understand the processes of the divestment that is going on.”