WUNRN

http://www.wunrn.com

 

INVISIBLE WOMEN VICTIMS - PRIVATE SECTOR PROFIT VS. HUMAN RIGHTS - STORIES RARELY TOLD - POWER RULES

 

Please read all parts of this WUNRN release.

_________________________________________________________

 

Today, Sunday, December 15, 2013, European television in a 2-hour period, had three high tech commercials on the benefits of oil company activity in Africa, including very much Nigeria. A company held responsible in the court for pollution + was included in the advertisers.

 

Nowhere do we hear the voices of the women who have for years been victims of such abuse and violation of rights, in the Niger Delta of Nigeria, and so many parts of this complex world.

 

Do we see the Niger Delta women women in extreme poverty at the Commission on the Status of Women? Do we hear their voices at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva? Are they part of the advocacy groups at the Climate Change Conference, or the Regional Consultations on the Post-2015 Development Agenda?

 

These women are trying to survive, with the compromises of health, water, food, existence, that have come with oil company domination and agreements of privilege to land and resources made without their inclusion.

 

When we hear that international agreements, policies, processes are inclusive, and that "Our Voices Are Needed," we best envision these women - and girls - who likely will never enter a high level chamber even in collective/collaborative advocacy, may not, indeed have the technical devices to connect them on social/public media, the legal rights to the land they occupy, even have literacy, and may feel threatened constantly by mercenaries who are paid to keep them passive and silent. They may not have access to international aid and foundations who are courageous and committed enough to help defend their rights.They may be in Nigeria, Central America, South Asia, all around this world, where private sector and vested interests rule, and women struggle, often silently, to cope.

 

LET WE FORGET - THESE ARE OUR SISTERS !

_________________________________________________________

 

----- Original Message -----

From: WUNRN ListServe

To: WUNRN ListServe

Sent: Sunday, March 31, 2013 9:03 PM

Subject: Nigeria - Oil Company Responsible but Years of Suffering for Women

 

WUNRN

http://www.wunrn.com

 

http://www.awid.org/News-Analysis/Friday-Files/Oil-Giant-Shell-is-Held-Responsible-for-Environmental-Pollution-A-Small-Victory-for-Women-in-The-Niger-Delta

 

NIGERIA - OIL GIANT SHELL HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION SMALL VICTORY FOR SUFFERING FOR YEARS BY WOMEN IN THE NIGER DELTA 

AWID - 29/03/2013 - - After a five-year-long case, a Dutch Court has held the Nigerian Subsidiary of Shell responsible for the pollution of farmlands in Nigeria, marking a victory in the struggle against the oil company that has been at the centre of environmental concerns in Nigeria for over 40 years. 

AWID interviewed Caroline Usikpedo, the National President of the Niger Delta Women’s Movement for Peace and Development (NDWPD), for a women’s rights perspective on the ongoing struggle against the oil giant

By Rochelle Jones - AWID

On 30 January this year, a Dutch Court ruled against a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, holding it responsible for the pollution of farmlands at Ikot Ada Udo, Akwa Ibom State in the coastal south of Nigeria. The Niger Delta is Africa’s largest Delta covering some 7000 square kilometres – a third of which is is made up of wetlands and it contains the largest mangrove forest in the world.

Petroleum exploration and production is Nigeria’s largest and most important industrial sector with oil accounting for almost 85% of current public revenue. This creates an awkward reality not just for nature, but for the 20 million people living in the Delta Region and particularly the minority and indigenous communities who, according to Caroline Usikpedo “have suffered maltreatment through political and economic marginalization, violence and environmental degradation.”

In describing what this struggle has looked like over the past decades, Usikpedo said it was related to the issue that, “fundamental freedoms and human rights stated in Nigerian Constitution are non-justiciable[i], thus rendering its objective on equality, trivial”. She also says that the Constitution is silent on Environmental Law and “it is important that the impact of the oil industry on the environment in the Niger Delta is understood as occurring in a context where the livelihoods, health and access to food and clean water of hundreds of thousands of people are closely linked to the land and environmental quality. The environmental damage that has been done, and continues to be done, as a consequence of oil production in the Niger Delta, has led to serious violations of human rights.”

Oil spills, waste dumping and gas flaring

According to Usikpedo, pollution has been affecting the area for decades. “This pollution has damaged the soil, water and air quality. Hundreds of thousands of people are affected, particularly the poorest and those who rely on traditional livelihoods such as fishing and agriculture. People living in the Niger Delta have to drink, cook with, and wash in polluted water; they eat fish contaminated with oil and other toxins - if they are lucky enough to still be able to find fish; the land they use for farming is being destroyed; after oil spills the air they breathe reeks of oil and gas and other pollutants; they complain of breathing problems, skin lesions and other health problems, but their concerns are not taken seriously and they have almost no information on the impacts of pollution.”

She says that gas flaring – which occurs when oil is pumped out of the ground and the gas produced is separated and then burnt as waste in massive flares – in particular creates unique problems: “Flares, which continue for 24 hours a day in many areas, cause serious discomfort to people living nearby with noise pollution and some communities living with permanent light. When gas is flared, the combustion is often incomplete, so oil droplets fall on waterways, crops, houses and people.” Despite concerns raised by communities and health professionals about the impact of gas flaring on people – in particular young children, women, the elderly and those with underlying health problems, – Usikpedo says “neither the government nor the oil companies have carried out specific studies to look at the impacts of flaring on human health. This serious failure leaves [thousands] of people facing unknown short- and long-term risks. This requires decisive and swift action to investigate and monitor their health status, to protect vulnerable groups and to end the practice of flaring.”

A women’s rights perspective of the environmental damage

The recent court ruling was a result of years of struggle – since 2008 - by communities in oil producing areas – assisted by environmental organisation Friends of the Earth. When asked how women were raising their voices against the polluting oil company, Usikpedo explains that for women, “environmental quality and sustainability are fundamental to their overall wellbeing and development [because] the people in the region depend on the natural environment as their principal or sole source of food… they use it for agriculture, fishing and the collection of forest products. Pollution and environmental damage pose significant risks to human rights.”

The Niger Delta Women’s movement for Peace and Development (NDWPD) was founded to provide relief following crises and to address violence against women - explicitly for poor and marginalised women and communities. Although poverty alleviation, social welfare, environmental justice and community rights have been used to lobby governments to take greater social responsibility Usikpedo asserts that “less is done in relation to women’s health in the Niger Delta. Life expectancy has reduced to 45 years of age for women. We said we cannot afford to be silent; the time to act is now. We decided to carry out  Gender and Climate Justice Hearings in 2009 with rural women who directly bear the burden of the impact of climate change and whose voices are least heard.”

The NDWPD is a member of the Feminist Task Force in collaboration with the Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP), Greenpeace International and Inter Press Service. NDWPD conducted three Justice hearings in the Delta – two in 2009 and one in 2011 -  based on the model: “Strengthening Voices: Search for Solutions: Women’s Tribunals on Gender and Climate Justice  The results of the 2009 hearings were presented at the civil society ‘Klimaforum’ in Copenhagen running concurrently to the United Nations Copenhagen Climate Conference (COP15). The aim of the 2011 Climate Justice Hearing was to up-scale local solutions and bring the voices of those most affected to influence negotiations and plans of action on climate change at the national as well as the international level during COP17 and Rio+ 20.

In addition to the hearings, the NDWPD has also carried out activities to enhance the participation of stakeholders in the on-going global climate change debate such as increasing the knowledge base and creating awareness among community leaders and the political class. Usikpedo says they also wanted to “alert the international community of the neglect exercised on rural women in rural communities.”

Court victory a small step forward

Despite the victory in court in January for the farmer in Ikot Ada Udo, the NDWPD are disappointed that a similar ruling on four other cases in neighbouring communities Goi and Oruma is not forthcoming. The court concluded that there was no proof that the spills at Goi in Rivers State and Oruma in Bayelsa State were not cleaned up and that there was indeed no proof the spills were not caused by sabotage (Shell’s defence argument in the case). The NDWPD are asking the court to review the case, and are left asking why a United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Report was not enough evidence to warrant a ruling against Shell in these cases. The report shows that “pollution from over 50 years of oil operations in the region has penetrated further and deeper than many may have supposed…some areas, which appear unaffected at the surface, are in reality severely contaminated underground”. Usikpedo corroborates the UNEP evidence, saying that today “Goi is a completely deserted land; people no longer live there due to the spill that occurred in 2005 without clean up and compensation.” She goes on to say “I think the court has ruled differently on these communities because they do not want Shell to be held liable for the second time. The court was very biased in this case, and were unjust, to avoid any precedents to be set”. Channa Samkalden, a lawyer acting on behalf of the Nigerian farmers, said to Al Jazeera recently: “At least Shell was held liable for one of the cases. That’s a good start. Also, a very important fact is that the court has said that Shell has a duty to take measures to prevent sabotage, which is of course a principal issue."

Usikpedo hopes “the work on environmental rights by UNEP and the international community, can avoid future tragedies such as the one which we are confronted with in the Niger Delta.” She wants her work to reflect the reality that “women in the Niger Delta are the most vulnerable - they bear the burden of the impact of climate change, poverty and human rights violations.” The NDWPD are calling on international communities to help raise awareness of the issues. “It is important that we gain as much support and empowerment as possible to help us in the campaign for peace and development in the Niger Delta, Nigeria.”

For more information, contact Niger Delta Women’s movement for Peace and Development E-Mail: nigerdeltawomen@gmail.com

[i] Not capable of being settled by law of by the action of a court

__________________________________________________________

 

----- Original Message -----

From: WUNRN ListServe

To: WUNRN ListServe

Sent: Monday, August 08, 2011 10:05 AM

Subject: Nigeria - Oil Spills Create Health Risks & Environment Damage - Women

 

WUNRN

http://www.wunrn.com

 

OIL CRISES IN LIVES OF WOMEN - Health, Work, Income, Food, Safe Water, Land, Environment, Rights, Nature & Wildlife, Infertility & Birth Deformities, Survival _____________________________________________________________________

 

UNEP - United Nations Environmental Programme

Full Text: http://new.unep.org/newscentre/Default.aspx?DocumentID=2649&ArticleID=8827&l=en

Abuja, 4 August 2011 - The environmental restoration of Ogoniland could prove to be the world's most wide-ranging and long term oil clean-up exercise ever undertaken if contaminated drinking water, land, creeks and important ecosystems are to be brought back to full, productive health. _____________________________________________________________________

 

Full Article - BBC - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-14398659

NIGERIA - Oogoniland Oil Spills Crises - Health Risks & Environment Damage 

 

Boy stands near an abandoned oil well head leaking crude oil, 11 April 2007, in Kegbara Dere, Ogoni Territory

The Ogoni people say their land has been devastated by pollution from the oil industry

 

August 4, 2011 - Nigeria's Ogoniland region could take 30 years to recover fully from the damage caused by years of oil spills, a long-awaited UN report says.

 

The study says complete restoration could entail the world's "most wide-ranging and long-term oil clean-up".

 

Communities faced a severe health risk, with some families drinking water with high levels of carcinogens, it said......

_____________________________________________________________________

 

----- Original Message -----

From: WUNRN ListServe

To: WUNRN ListServe

Sent: Tuesday, May 04, 2010 12:29 PM

Subject: Nigeria - Oil Crisis for Women in Niger Delta

 

WUNRN

http://www.wunrn.com

 

OIL CRISES IN LIVES OF WOMEN - Health, Work, Income, Food, Safe Water, Land, Environment, Rights, Nature & Wildlife, Infertility & Birth Deformities, Survival

 

Oil slicks, fumes, oil-related anguish, from the Caribbean, to Alaska, to Asia, to Africa, and beyond, can suddenly disrupt and destroy sustainable lives, and often without compensation or restoration.

 

_______________________________________________________________________

 

ISIS International - Women in Action Publication

Women in a Weary World - Climate Change & Women in the Global South

 

http://www.isiswomen.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1351&Itemid=10

 

Link to Full 8-Page Article:

When Blessing Becomes a Curse in the Niger Delta


By Betty Abah