A right activist and executive director of the Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF), Rev. Nnimmo Bassey has called for the conduct of environmental and health audit of the entire Niger Delta region.
Bassey made the call yesterday while speaking with journalists on the sideline of the ongoing Niger Delta Climate Change conference in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital.
He stated that Niger Deltans should not only be concerned about the restoration of the degraded environment, but the restoration of livelihood, which will in turn, restore the economy of the region.
The activist said: “Climate change impacts require actions; it is usually adaptation and mitigation. The mitigation aspect is one: Nigeria should stop gas flaring and quickly shift away from the burning of fossil fuel completely.
“But, in terms of adapting, people have to be able to survive. Number one thing is to carry out environmental and health audit of the entire region, so that you can know what is the problem and the action to be taken.
“Just like the Ogoni clean up, it came up after the environmental audit. Bayelsa State government has carried out an environmental and health audit of Bayelsa State by the State Oil and Environment Commission that issued a report in August last year.
“So, we need to do that but, the emphasis we are making is that, you must take note, not just concerned with the cleaning or restoring the environment, you have to restore the people.
“It is about restoring lives and restoring livelihood as well as restoring the environment. If the environment is good, livelihood will revive, if livelihood is revived, the economy will be revived and people will be more resilient to global impacts.
“We know what the problems are but if we don’t clean up the Niger Delta, whatever you do is like a waste of time.”
