INTERNATIONAL WOMEN`S DAY:ERA HOLDS ROUNDTABLE ON NIGER DELTA WOMEN`S PLIGHT



As part of activities to mark this year`s International Women`s day, Environmental Rights Action (ERA) friends of the earth, organised a media forum, showcasing the plight of the Women of the Niger Delta. Joe Okei Odunmakin, president of Women Arise said she visited the Niger Delta region sometime ago and saw an obituary of a thirty one year old woman and written on the obituary was after a life well spent. This made her to understand that life expectancy for the Women of Niger Delta has dropped drastically. The reason for this is obvious according to a BBC correspondent, Fidelis Mbah. Mbah who had a presentation at the forum said, because of the oil spills in the region, their men whose major occupation is fishing can no longer fullfil their responsiblities as the head of their families, hence subjecting their wives into unnecessary hardship. These men frustrated by the spills, according to Mbah, impregnate their wives in the village, run to the city for a while and come back and impregnate them again and again. Their women take care of their children and their husbands. The spill has actually rendered their husbands useless, and their women have to suffer for it. Betty Abah, Gender Focal Person ERA said the women of Niger Delta grow older than their ages because they over work themselves as a result of the natural deposit called crude oil which has made their land unproductive for their husband who would have naturally taken good care of them. What baffles Abah most is that the present president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria comes from that region but nothing seems to be done to alleviate the sufferings of the women of Niger Delta. Ugonma Cokey, correspondent with the voice of Nigeria urged journalists to report Niger Delta the way it is. It`s our social responsibilty to let the truth be known. What we hear about Niger Delta is not a myth. It is true she argued. Let`s not sit down and wait for press releases, but let`s do investigations and get the truth unveiled. Picture above L-R: Betty Abah, Gender Focal Person Environmental Rights Action (ERA), Joe Okei-Odunmakin, president of Women Arise and Fidelis Mbah, correspndent with British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) at the media forum focussing on the plight of women of the Niger Delta at Ogba Lagos Nigeria on March 12, 2012



A Niger Deltan woman showing the oil she fetched from the river instead of water



This women are protesting against the oil spill in the Niger Delta region which has killed all the fish in the river and has turned their white nets into oil colour



Displaying the oil they fetched from the river instead of water

A Niger Delta woman paddling the canoe in search of drinking water, in a water endowed environment



River turned oil as a result of the spill. This is the scene that has rendered the men of the Njger Delta useless because their major occupation is fishing. How can fish survive in this environment?



This is the chevron rig that went aflame on the 16th of January and burnt for 46days till it went off by itself.

Ugonma Cokey, correspondent with voice of Nigeria, calls for the intervention of Nigerian journalists on the Niger Delta issue.Photos by Tonero Photo Agency and Fidelis Mbah