IWG expresses concern over increasing oil pollution-related health hazards in N’Delta

By Aherhoke Okioma

A non-governmental organisation (NGO), the International Working Group on Petroleum Pollution and Just Transition (IWGPPJT) in the Niger Delta, has described as highly traumatising the impact of oil pollution on the environment and health of the people of Bayelsa State.

The NGO, which is currently carrying out a sensitisation campaign on health hazards associated with the menace in the state, disclosed this during a visit to Governor Douye Diri, in Yenagoa.

Speaking through its team lead, Professor Engobo Emeseh, the group expressed concern that average life expectancy in Bayelsa has reduced significantly as the “people are forced to live on contaminated land, air and water.

Professor Emeseh, who is of the Law Faculty of Aberystwyth University, United Kingdom, clarified that the IWG is focusing advocacy on the health of the people in line with the recommendations of the Bayelsa State Oil and Environmental Commission (BSOEC) report, which was submitted in 2023.

She disclosed that laboratory analysis of blood samples taken from indigenes from across the eight local government areas in Bayelsa indicated high levels of hydrocarbon pollution and carcinogenic metals, causing a sharp increase in mortality and morbidity rates in the state.

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Emeseh, who commended the Bayelsa government for being the first sub-national government, to set up a high-powered commission on oil and environment, said the IWG will continue to partner the state and other relevant organisations to mitigate the negative impact of oil pollution on the health of the people.

“Most of us here were constituted as members of the BSOEC. We gave our report in 2023; first presented at the House of Lords, and also presented to the Bayelsa government here in Creek Haven in October 2024, and then presented to the wider public in Abuja.

“In all of this, the Bayelsa government has given us the space and the support to provide our expertise and advice on how to deal with the challenge of the scourge of oil pollution in our state.

“We presented our report based on the evidence that we gathered, having gone to all the local government areas in Bayelsa, and spoken to indigenes and key stakeholders in the state.

“My colleagues and I, who were members of the expert working group, were quite traumatised at what we found in the state, and we called our report an environmental genocide.

“Based on that, we committed that though our commission was decommissioned in November 2024, that we were going to carry on with this work,” Emeseh said.

In his response, Governor Douye Diri, represented by his deputy, Dr Peter Akpe, described the report of the BSOEC as one of the most important documents to guide concerted actions in the mitigation of environmental hazards from oil pollution in the state.

Diri thanked members of the IWG for partnering the government by making their expertise available to the ongoing efforts towards mitigating the impact of oil pollution on the health of Bayelsa residents.

Members of the six-man delegation include Dr. Kathryn Nwajiaku-Dahou, representing ODI Global UK; Professor Michael Watts of University of California; and Dr. Isaac Osuoka of York University, Canada.

Others are Professor Anna Zalik, also from York University, Canada, and Dr. Cautlin Strong of the ODI Global, United Kingdom.