The call was made by the founder of a community-based organisation known as Egbebiri Livelihood, Environment and Development Initiative (ELEDI), Lucky Bennett, in Yenagoa.
Speaking to newsmen, he said the spill which occurred on the 22nd October 2018 has wrecked more havoc than any of its kind because the recent flood carried the crude to residential areas contaminating their source of drinking water.
Explaining further, he called on National Emergency Management Agency to urgently put measures in place that prevent the people of the area from suffering any form of hazard as a result of the spill as they plan to relocate to the community after the flood recedes.
Speaking further, he said “the facility where the spill occurred is owned by the Nigerian Agip Oil Company, in Egbebiri land. The facility is known as Idu Wells in location 5 and 11. The whole town is littered with crude oil.
“And because the spill occurred during the flood season, water carried the crude into our rivers and wells we fetch drinking water from. Our people use river water for drinking, cooking and other domestic uses like bathing. And that shows how dangerous it is to our health, as indigenes of Egbebiri.
“We are appealing to the federal government through NEMA to help us provide alternative sources of drinking water as our people plan to relocate to their home after the flood recedes completely.”
According to Ogiama Solomon, a farmer from the community ‘’the oil spill happened around 5:00 am on Monday, 22nd October 2018 and officials of NAOC went and put it off about 2:30 pm the same day.
“The Joint Investigation Visit [JIV] has been conducted and the cause of the spill was identified as equipment failure, with over 200 barrels of crude oil spewed and spread over an area of 5,420 meters in the community.
“And since after the JIV was conducted, Agip is yet to do anything to clean up the spill site. They have not also gone to see what can be done about the crude that was carried by the flood into our community.”
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