Rivers youths lament oil spill

President of Kula Youths Organisations, Japus Ekine, yesterday, disclosed that many communities in the Kingdom are affected by the spill, and that the incident was not an act of sabotage. He said it was a mechanical error on the company’s part.

“A particular oil hoard, OML 29, Well 1, just got busted. The head is off and it does not look like sabotage. It looks like a mechanical error. The place is highly polluted with hydrocarbon spill everywhere. From our waterfront and the mangroves, everywhere is destroyed. Apparently, the environment is polluted,” he said.

He condemned the negative impact of the hydrocarbon spillage on the ecosystem and the people, whose means of livelihood it has disrupted.

He said: “Kula people are majorly fishermen. We live through fishing, and our women pick periwinkles and all that. But this oil spill will definitely affect our mangrove, and our women will no longer have periwinkles. The fishes will also die. 

“The nets of some residents in the area are soaked in oil. They cannot even get fish to catch, which means such individuals’ livelihood has crumbled.”

He appealed to the federal and state governments to intervene and save the people and their environment, especially as the spill was still ongoing as at the time of filing this report.