Nigeria, Ogoniland: communities demand oil pollution clean-up and compensation

Residents of Ogoniland (pop. 832,000), in Rivers State, Nigeria, are demanding compensation and clean-up of the oil that has polluted water sources and destroyed their livelihoods.  A UNEP study [1] published in August 2011, concluded that the environmental restoration of Ogoniland could take 25 to 30 years and would require an initial investment of US$ 1 billion contributed by the oil industry and the Government.

Communities relying on polluted wells should immediately be provided with adequate sources of drinking water, the UNEP study said. However, three months after the release of the study, only two of the ten communities where drinking water was found to be dangerously contaminated by oil had been provided with safe water, claimed Chris Newsom of Stakeholder Democracy Network.

A water tanker supplies potable water to a community in Nisioken Ogale, 15 Sep 2011. Photo: UNEP

Ghana: donors urged to help prevent corruption in the water sector

The Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII) has appealed to donor agencies to introduce anti-corruption policies and tools in all their water sector activities. This was one of the recommendations of Ghana’s National Water Supply Integrity Study [1] undertaken by GII as part of the Transparency and Integrity in Service Delivery in Africa (TISDA) programme funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The GII study mentions not only petty corrupt practices like illegal connections and illegal payments to meter readers, but also instances where a single contractor bought and priced all bidding documents.