Journalist Laments Environmental Damage By Artisanal Refineries

The Chairman of the Correspondents’ Chapel of the Rivers State Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Mr. Amaechi Okonkwo, has lamented the serious damage that illegal crude oil bunkering is causing in some oil bearing communities in Rivers State.
Mr. Okonkwo, who just returned from a trip to some oil producing communities in Andoni Local Government Area, described as wicked the operations of the illegal bunkerers and artisanal oil refineries.
He said the operations of the illegal refineries, known as Kpofire locally, have snuffed life out of the environment as a lot of animal life has been decimated.
“Ooh! If only those engaged in the wicked trade of illegal bunkering or kpofire as it’s popularly called around here knew the collateral damage their business does to the environment, beyond loss of revenue, they would just repent and turn again from their wicked ways,” Mr. Amaechi lamented.
He said he had an opportunity to visit and stay overnight in one of the communities and was shocked by what confronted him. He said he did not see a single sea life in the creeks.
He said, “The telltale signs were ample around the environment. You know that fearful aura around the streams late evenings accompanied by all manner of sounds from birds, toads, frogs and the unidentifiable and recognisable ones, none was heard at the bank of this river, the creeks of Ataba, off Andoni River.
“Before darkness set in and the tide returned I didn’t see a single fish leap off the river and back again, no single bird was heard chirping no seen among the hundreds of species that survive on creeping sea foods. None was seen rummaging the muddy river banks with the beaks for daily bread.
“The closest to a bird I saw, was in the afternoon and they were watching from a long distance high from the heavens, two kites or their kind of birds.”
He also noted that he did not notice even the resilient mosquito. “Among the scores of persons at the environment then, I did not see or hear anyone slap or beat themselves in order to ward off mosquitoes and similar flying or creeping insects. No mosquitoes, no crickets, no butterflies or even the unfriendly ones, no lizards or any in that family was sighted anywhere close,” he said.
Mr. Okonkwo said the peculiar smell of the sea was missing and subsumed under the smell of crude oil mixed with poorly refined diesel and wastes from the artisanal refineries.
He said, “We only saw wasted abandoned oil bunkering facilities, boilers, steel reservoirs, steel pipes, rubber hoses and vast area of vegetation raped and damaged by the spills. Eventually we had to leave.
“It was not an enjoyable adventure for me because I left with a heavy heart on how we (man) can just decide to be our own worst enemies. Environmentalists and those who know and were patient to read this piece will understand.”