Fear grips Bayelsa community over gas leakage — Fear has gripped indigenes of Ikarama community in Yenagoa Local Government Area of Bayelsa State, over the strange odour in the area, caused by alleged discharge of large volume of amixture of crude oil and gas into the air from an oil facility. It was learnt that the leakage which occurred within Agip’s onshore oil field close to the Taylor Creek oil well was noticed by members of the community on Monday. Spokesmen of Ikarama Development Committee, Washington Odoyibo, yesterday, in Yenagoa, said that the community noticed the development on Monday and regretted that the oil firm was yet to stop the leakage. “The sound from the spill site could be heard even from our community, especially in the night where the community is relatively quiet. This confirms that it is really a serious spill. It was on Monday that one of our community ladies returned from the bush and told us that there was a very serious oil spill spraying like gas into the air from an Agip pipeline. “On the cause of spill, you cansee that it is not easy to get closer to the spill point because of the way the whole environment is covered with crude oil fume. Hence, one cannot even guess the cause,” Odoyibo said. He said members of the community were avoiding the leakage site for safety reasons as they were all concerned about an outbreak of fire and inhaling the toxic gas. Reacting to the incident, Head of Environmental Rights Action,ERA, Field Operations in Bayelsa, Mr Alagoa Morris, urged the oil firm to lessen thepressure on the pipelines to reduce the discharge into the atmosphere. He said that ERA had conducted a field trip to the impacted site and noted that the environment had been negatively affected by the incident, stressed the need fora Joint Investigation of the incident by the operator of theoil field, community representatives and oil industry regulators as well as the clean up of the impacted site. ….As Govt releases N230m for Agge seaport By Samuel Oyadongha Yenagoa—Bayelsa State Government has presented a cheque for N230 million representing 50 per cent of the consultancy fee to Scot Wilson and Arup to conduct feasibility studies on the proposed Agge Deep Seaport in Ekeremor Local Government Area of the state within a period of nine months. Vanguard learnt that the deepseaport, when completed will accelerate development not only in Agge on the Atlantic shore but the entire Ekeremor and communities in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area onthe coast line. Presenting the draft to a representative of the company, Mr. Lai Are in Yenagoa, Governor Seriake Dickson, described the Deep Sea Port as a key investment infrastructure geared towards reducing the state’s dependency on oil and gas revenue. The governor, who noted that government had sought the approval of the Federal Government to declare the Deep Sea Port a Trade Free Zone for oil and gas, said government would collaborate with the private sector for the realisation of the project. Dickson also remarked that theNigerian Army had already surveyed an area of over 15,000 hectares with the intention of designating the zone a Port City to enable Bayelsa reap the benefits of being a littoral state. He said: “As we speak, we have already surveyed an area of over 15,000 hectares,which will give us a wonderful port city. I have commenced application for that area to be designated as oil and gas trade free zone and have received assurances of the President that that request willbe looked into and I am aware that it is being processed.”
Posted on: Thu, 11 Jul 2013 05:20:51 +0000
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015