Oil Companies to pay heavily for spills – President Yar’adua
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Jul 19, 2007, 09:43

President Umaru Musa Yar’adua has said that oil companies operating in Nigeria must be made to pay heavy fines for spills caused by them.

He was responding to a presentation by the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA) at the State House, Abuja on July 18.

In his comments, President Yar’adua pointed out that in view of the widespread negative impact of oil spills on the environment, the regulatory authorities must ensure that stiff penalties were imposed on companies that defaulted in cleaning up the spills.

He directed NOSDRA to liaise with other government and non-governmental agencies in order to effectively discharge its roles as a policing body of oil spills and get service providers to clean up the environment.

In the course of making the presentation, NOSDRA Director-General, Dr. Bamidele Ajakaiye, highlighted some effects of oil pollution on the environment as including contamination of ground and surface water sources, disruption of balance in the ecosystem, reduction in the economic potentiality of the affected communities, and the high cost of remediation of contaminated sites

NOSDRA, a parastatal under the Federal Ministry of Environment, Housing and Urban Development, was established in 2006 by an Act of the National Assembly. Its purpose is to “create, nurture and sustain a zero-tolerance oil spill incident in the Nigerian environment.” Its functions include “surveillance and ensuring compliance with all existing legislation and the detection of oil spills in the petroleum sector,” and coordinating responses to such incidents throughout the country.

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