There is palpable fear among residents of Satellite Town, a suburb of Lagos as some of the residents have raised alarm that concrete walls erected by some tank farms are blocking the water channel in the community, resulting in flooding and other environmental hazards.
Confirming this to Shipping Position Daily last week, Vice Chairman of the Satellite Town Central Resident Association at Oriade Local Council Development Area of Satellite Town; Mazi Tony Ohakwe said that areas like Ijegun, Alaba Ogiri, Maruwa road and Navy barracks have been taken over by flood.
He said some tank farms acquired a vast expanse of land around the area, which has been fortified with concrete walls to protect their investments and this in-turn, is blocking drainage channels.
Mazi Ohakwe said: “We started the fight four years ago, as at the time we started the battle, there were only about four or five tank farms there, but today, they are more than 16 tank farms in the area, and the ugly aspect of it is that they have blocked the drainage”
“The drainage from Maruwa Road was channelled through the canal to the ocean, but now the tank farms have blocked it, there is a place called Alaba Ogiri street, the water there cannot flow and it is causing a heavy flood for residents who are there”.
“Recently we just took pictures which we wanted to present to the Lagos State Government. When we started the fight with these tank farm people, the Omo Oniles thought they were doing themselves good, so they fought us, but today, they are the ones suffering it, most houses in those areas now are blocked, there is a great flood” he added.
He called on the Lagos State Government under Governor Akinwunmi Ambode to muster the political will and pursue the case with the Federal Government to ensure that the tank farm licenses are revoked.
Speaking on the past efforts of the residents, Mazi Ohakwe said that “some two years ago when Fashola was the Governor of Lagos State, we made a presentation to him, the state ministry of environment met with us at Alausa with the tank farm people, we also held another one with the Federal Ministry of Environment when they said they were coming to conduct Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) they came, we made a presentation”
“In the past, it was a government of two parties, APC was in Lagos State while PDP was at the Federal, Fashola told us then point blank that they were not the people that issued the license and that the license was issued by the Federal Government”
“Now that APC is in the Federal Government, we want to know what they will do, because all the people living close to the waterside, including Ijegun are always flooded, the flood also disturbed Navy Town, some of the houses live on flood” he said.
Shipping Position Daily correspondent who visited the tank farm area last week counted about seven depots already operational, while four other facilities were already under construction.
A major road leading to the depot area, Mumuni Adio Badmus, has very small drains that are grossly undersized to harvest storm water; All adjourning drains within the estate had been blocked with concrete walls making the estate to be flooded.
Discussion about this post