By Ajibola Adedoye
Philip Jakpor, Executive Director, Renevlyn Development Initiative (RDI) has called on the government of Nasarawa State to carry out a comprehensive environmental audit of Abuni community, Uke district and environs so as to determine the rate of damage on the environment as a result of the activities of miners in the state.
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Jakpor made the call during a media session organized in Lagos on Wednesday, October 2, 2024.
He said: “The reason why we convened this media interaction is because of the need to let Nigerians and particularly the nasarawa state government know the situation in mining communities in that state. We are all aware that nasarawa has been in the news because of the discovery of lithium in commercial quantity, aside other natural resources that are found in that state. But we are coming from a background of people who have worked and seen the situation of oil extraction in the Niger Delta, and we don’t want a repeat of that solid minerals extraction, especially lithium, which is infrastructure. And so we decided to visit some of the communities in Nasarawa to see what it is like. And our findings are very, very disturbing. They are very, very shocking, especially in Uke district in Karun local government area, and what we have found is disturbing, because we found out that just like you have locals in the Niger Delta complaining about the parts of oil and gas exploration extraction, the same situation is now playing out with solid minerals, especially we’ve seen community land ruined.
“To worsen an already bad situation, a Chinese mining firm called Multiverse Mining
Company is now making the lives of the people a living hell on earth through their reckless extraction of solid minerals outside the approved sites, indiscriminate rock blasting which continues to shake the foundations of the community and the environmentally unsound practice of channeling the waste water from the mines into farmlands and the Rafin Jaki River where locals fish.
“We learnt that the wastewater channeled to the Rafin Jaki River was responsible for the deaths of nine children in 2023 after they came down with serious and
unexplained illnesses after swimming in als say they only have dealings with the state government and not the host community.
“We have also seen farmlands ruined. We’ve seen pollution of ground water. We’ve seen pollution of rivers that people depend on fishing and consumption needs, and unfortunately, the people are sending an SOS, and that’s why we the organizations involved in it, the Renevlyn Development Initiative and partners such as The Environmental Defenders Network (EDEN), Citizens Free Service Forum (CFSF) and Neighborhood
Environment Watch (NEW) Foundation decided to send a petition to the national state House of Assembly through the Chairman Committee on the Environment, on the need to visit these communities and see what is happening, and then ensure that the right environmental standards and place, or else, those communities are already a time bomb ready to explode. Time Bomb because of the level of sex slavery going on, time bomb for the number of out of school children, who are now going into the mines and doing what adults with proper gear should do. If you go to those mining communities, you discover that kids as young as eight are already going into the mining pits. They are introduced to illicit substance so that they go into those mines and they interact with dangerous chemicals that will have dangerous implications of their health.
So we are calling on the state government to do something about this, and that’s why we convey our message and we are waiting for response.
As we wait to hear from the government, we want resident of these communities to continue to document what is happening in their domain.
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