Peremabiri community in Bayelsa berates Shell for poor response to oil spill

Nathan Tamarapreye, Yenagoa

The people of Peremabiri community in Bayelsa on Friday regretted the insensitivity, and neglect by the Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC) over an oil spill that occurred for two weeks.

News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the Chiefs, elders, youths and women groups in the coastal settlement on the banks of River Nun in Southern Ijaw Local Government said that the spill is yet to abate.

According to them the continuous discharge of crude into the environment has polluted the Nun River, swamps and farmlands causing untold hardship to the predominantly fishing and farming settlement.

Mr Return Koma, Chairman, Peremabiri c Community Development Committee in a statement called on the government of Bayelsa and regulators to rise up to the occasion and halt the leak.

They also called on the Bayelsa State Ministry of Mineral Resources, Ministry of Environment and environment focused no governmental organisations like the Environmental Rights Action to intervene.

He noted that the leak had polluted the entire Diebu Creek area and caused the parties to compel SPDC to ensure a stoppage of the spill and ensure a comprehensive clean-up of the affected areas.

According to the statement, Peremabiri community is currently bleeding profusely with oil spills as the whole river, swamps, ponds, farmlands and the general environment of the community had been devastated by the spillage.

The community said Shell was yet to take any step to mitigate the adverse impact of the oil and gas leakages polluting the areas.

According to the community, concerted efforts have been made to Shell to carry out a Joint Investigation Visit (JIV) to find out the cause, volume, extent and impact of the spillage and depressurize the acidity and pave way for response to no avail.

The community claimed that SPDC had been foot-dragging to commence a visit to the impacted area, and rather remained silent on the lingering oil spillage incident.

The community urge the State Government, well-meaning individuals and all relevant environmental authorities to compel SPDC for a speedy end to the leakage.

They urged remediation of the spill site while advocating for the immediate constitution of a Joint Investigation Visit team to ascertain the remote causes of the incident.

They further called for relief materials from the government, SPDC and comprehensive health care arrangements for the directly affected people.

The statement urged residents in the various fishing and farming settlements along the spill site to relocate to safer locations in view of the health implications.

It could not immediately ascertain if the leak is from one of the many assets that SPDC divested from in recent moves to move out of land operations towards deep waters exploration.

The management of SPDC was yet to respond to a request for a reaction