Bayelsa fishing settlements lament effects of Conoil spill

By IGONIKO ODUMA, Yenagoa

A fresh oil spill has been reported at the Oil Min­ing Lease (OML) 59 op­erated by Conoil Produc­ing Limited around the Angofield, near Tamazu settlements in Koluama Clan in the Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of Bayelsa State.

It was gathered that the spill incident occurred from the indigenous oil firm’s wellhead 1 on Jan­uary 30, and “was spew­ing crude oil in gaseous form from an elbow of a pipeline linked directly to the Ango wellhead 1.”

Crude oil and gas leaked in various quan­tities from the affected facility till February 2 when a team from Con­oil mobilised to stop the spill, sources said.

Before the team ar­rived at the spill site, crude oil had flowed into the marine environment of the fishing settlements in the area on the fringes of the Atlantic Ocean.

The chairman of Koluama clan oil and gas committee, Jonathan Am­abebe, and the Tamazu community development committee (CDC) chair­man, Ebibotei Kerima­ma, confirmed the devel­opment, stating that the spill was being spread by the tidal ebb of the river.

They said that resi­dents were not comfort­able over the pollution caused by the spill be­cause of its impact on their health and liveli­hood.

Amabebe said, “A simi­lar incident occurred last December (2021), even then, Conoil did nothing positive concerning that by way of reaction.

“This one has hap­pened again and it really spread in the environ­ment but they have used dispersants, chemicals to dissolve or sink the crude oil in the water.

“However, they couldn’t succeed in silencing the environment as the vege­tation at the banks of the river told their story of pollution. There were vis­ible crude oil and soiled oily leaves.” (Sunday Independent)