By: Felix Ikpotor
As the world comemmorates the World Ocean Day held every June 8, a non governmental organization, Health of Mother Earth Foundation, HOMEF and FishNet have emphasized the need to protect the ocean from dangerous waste in order to safeguard the planet.
Executive Director of HOMEF, Dr Nnimmo Bassey while emphasising the need to protect the ocean from pollution, noted as wrong, the notion that the ocean is self-cleansing. He said such notion has made many turn the ocean into a dumping ground for all kinds of toxic waste.
He stated that the ocean and other water bodies are continuously subjected to a barrage of assaults at local, national, and international levels.
Bassey said because of the attitude of many towards the ocean, coastal communities have now been left to bear the brunt of the pollution.
“The concept that the ocean cycles itself and acts as a greenhouse gas sink has been misconstrued to mean that the ocean can filter and clean itself no matter what is dumped in it. The ocean and other waterbodies have become dump sites of all sorts, polluting and extreme exploitation. There are a lot of unusual activities going on in our waters that must not be allowed to continue if we want a healthy ocean and planet,” he said.
“Corporate interests have been substituted for national and people-centred interests, as communities that live along the coasts, bear the brunt of such abnormalities,” Bassey added.
He called for collective action to safeguard the ocean from further pollution.
Bassey lamented the continued burning of the Ororo Oil well over a period of five years now, saying it is a sad commentary on ecocide on Nigeria’s waters.
On his part, Stephen Oduware, a Programme Manager with HOMEF and Coordinator of the Fishnet Alliance, a network of fishers across Africa, stressed that the world’s fisheries depend on the ocean.
Oduware lamented further that vested and powerful interest was affecting the fishing in Africa.
“The two major sides of the ocean bordering Africa – the Atlantic and Indian, along with their associated gulfs, are experiencing shortfalls in fishing due to vested and powerful interests. Industrial fishing, including the use of bottom trawlers, is partly responsible for unsustainable fishing and illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing in the region,” he stated.
He said the practices not only harm fisheries but also harm the ocean and create imbalances in the ecosystems the ocean supports, calling for a stop to such practices.
“These unchecked activities in the territorial waters of Africa must stop. Fishers of the world unite,” he insists.
