Last week, the Anambra state commissioner for Environment, Dr. Ifedi Okwenna
said that he has submitted a list of 62 erosion sites to
Abuja that will cost Anambra state government
more than N17bn. He went ahead to state that the 62 sites are “the critical
ones”. Other non-critical include “550 very active erosion sites and 1, 000
erosion sites”. What prompted this piece was first; the comment by the
commissioner that “Last year, we did not receive any grant for ecological
problem, what we did was that we used our internally generated revenue and part
of the federation account to solve the problem” and second the continued
politicization and irresponsible reporting form Ukpaka reports on the issue to
the level that they are now analyzing the mystics of some “spiritual forces
housed in the gully”.
The problem of erosion menace has not been solved in Anambra state and will
not be solved but controlled and managed to the extent that erosion sites will no
longer force people to abandon their homes and farm lands. Worthy of mention
here for all genuinely concerned with the menace of erosion in South Eastern
Nigeria in that the threat posed by the “non-critical” 550 very active and
1,000 erosion site identified by the commissioner far exceeds the present 62
critical sites that attention is being focused on. In the next fifteen to twenty years, these so
called “non-critical” sites will develop into erosion monsters affecting human
settlement, agricultural lands, thereby seriously hampering economic and social
aspects of human existence in South Eastern Nigeria.
I’ve also watched ukpakareports.com in its search for
political relevance in Igbo nation constitutes itself into a nuisance. The articles
on its so called erosion center has been so inarticulate and bungled up that
the latest piece on its “activism” on erosion was on the “spiritual forces” and
“supernatural powers” at the gully sites. Whoever is behind those series of
write-ups on erosion in South Eastern Nigeria should be reminded that the threat
is real and not a fiction. I’ve been to more that ten erosion sites throughout
the region (including the Nanka, Amaokala, Aguly Nnobi, Njaba) in the course of
carrying out a scientific research on the relationship between Nanaka Sandstone
and erosion in Anambra Basin, and I never for once felt such forces. Maybe
because I was searching for solutions and not seeking cheap political relevance
in the midst of negligence from Town Unions, Local and State Governments.
The question is why have we failed to effectively control this erosion
menace that has been observed since the early 40s? Why have successive
governments at all levels failed to give the issue the attention it deserves?
I think it all has to do with the same old endemic disease the whole country
has been caught up with. The sickness of waiting until infrastructures
dilapidates beyond manageable level and we then start seeking intervention,
quoting huge contract sums and playing the blame game. The same old vicious
circle has been played out over and over again in South Eastern Nigeria –
waiting for grant from the ecological fund from the federal government. The
commissioner is eagerly awaiting the passage of a bill that would see the
emergence of a new agency to manage ecological funds by the National Assembly.
He is hoping that the agency would now come out with criteria that would
determine which state gets ecological fund. Nonsense. Every state is waiting
for that easy money from the federal government under whatever guise or
classification. Funds that end up not been accounted for.
Meanwhile, the problem of soil erosion in South Eastern
Nigeria is one that can easily be managed by concerted effort involving the
Town Unions, corporate organizations (through Corporate Social Responsibility),
the academia, Local and State governments. This comprehensive approach I will
outline in a follow up piece- Revenue Generation and Job Creation Through
Erosion Control in South
Eastern Nigeria. However, as a way of looking beyond the
present rhetoric and failed policies on erosion menace in South Eastern
Nigeria, and focusing on practical measure for effective control, it will be
necessary to outline the root caused and remedies.
Causes
For the benefit of given a scientific insight into the root
causes of this erosion menace in South Eastern Nigeria, I will summarize the
findings from my MSc research on the sedimentology of Nanka Sandstone with view
to understanding its relationship to devastating erosion menace in Anambra
Basin. From this study, the factors which led to gullying include the
erodibility of the lithologic units and topography of the areas within the
Anambra
Basin of which Nanka Sandstone plays a
critical role.
My findings show that the Nanka Sandstone (one of the
lithologic units in the basin) is a friable snandstone that lacks depositional
matrix that would have held the particles together. The percentage of mobile
cataions is 96-98% which makes is chemically unstable. Thus, what happens in
most parts of South Eastern Nigeria is that, when sheet erosion are neglected,
fluvial erosion and mass wasting acting singly or in combination washes away
the top soil and once Nanka Sandstone is exposed, it disaggregates easily
leading to gullying. At this stage, the
erosion becomes intractable and so rapid that control measures becomes too
expansive and most times overwhelming and thus erosion sites abandoned.
Remedies
Over the years, the people of the areas most affected by
this erosion menace have been devising means of controlling it by applying such
anti-erosion measures as digging of catchments pits, contour-walling, tree planting etc. these efforts proved to be of little
effect and the menace continued unabated. Reasons for failure were among
others, inadequacy and unsuitability of methods used and most importantly, the
intractability of the problem.
In evaluating the relationship between the chemistry of
Nanka Sandstone to the devastating erosion menace in Anambra Basin, I pointed
out that as the result of the nature, grain size, mineralogy and instability of
the cations in the sandstone, the most important and effective way of
controlling gullying in Anambra Basin is mechanical leveling by bulldozing to
level out small and incipient sheet erosion sites as soon as the are notices,
proper channeling of run-offs and then applying
the preventive measures (Okonkwo C. O., 2002).
Words of Wisdom
It has been said that “If you dispute land ownership
empty-handed, the person who has yams will be planting them”. As we dispute over irrelevant issues and
politicize the menace of erosion empty handed (while waiting for ecological
grants to be misused) flood, armed with yams continued to eat up the heart of
South Eastern Nigeria.
Someone has to inform ukpakareports, Anambra state
commissioner for environment and all state governments in South Eastern Nigeria
that the issues of erosion menace is a serious matter that should be addressed with
sincere commitment to practical solutions by critically looking at the real causes
and religiously following recommendations of Environmental professionals.
Enough of this rhetoric.
churchill.okonkwo@student.american.edu
Coming up - Revenue
Generation and Job Creation Through Erosion Control in South
Eastern
Nigeria
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