Experts warn of dangers for west Africa

The potentials for disaster and humanitarian crisis along the coastal state of West Africa is increasingly stark, according to disaster management experts, and countries within the sub-region need to develop programmes to manage these.

Some of the experts, gathered recently in Abuja, under a Humanitarian Future Programme (HFP) of the ECOWAS Commission and the Kings College, London, also said the possibilities of humanitarian crisis is intensifying in distinctly different ways at local and regional levels.

They point at a recent discovery that Nigeria’s waterways was under threat. Marine scientists recently found leakages from an underground pipe carrying gas through the water channel at the Tin Can inland- Liverpool Bridge.

Tunde Agboola, a professor of Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Ibadan presented some crisis scenarios that may occur in West Africa in the nearest future if contingency plans are not developed against it.

One of such scenarios was the possibility of a gas fire along the West African coast where the pipelines for the West African Gas

Pipeline is currently laid.

According to Mr Agboola, an outbreak of such fire has the potentials of displacing million of inhabitants in about five member states, leading to mass movement of people within and outside the region.

Other issues that may led to a possible humanitarian crisis in the region, according to him, include: oil spillage, gas blow out, sea surge, sudden sea level rise, water pollution and salt water intrusion.

“In the next two decades virtually all West African coastal states (12 states) could emerge as commercial oil and gas producers,” he said. “While this could constitute a driver and catalyst for economic growth and development, such infrastructure will actually increase the sub-region’s vulnerability to some type of disaster.”

He was of the opinion that should any of the crisis occur, cities along the West African coast would submerge, all economic gains of the region would be lost, the region’s flora and fauna would also be lost and underground water would be polluted.

He was not the only one with dire predictions. Mary Mye-Kamara, Director, Disaster Management Department, Office of the National Security, Sierra Leone said the West African sub-region is prone to more disasters than was hitherto imagined.

Ms. Mye-Kamara cited the River Niger, which flows through five states in the region as another potential candidate for disaster, in view of the present use of the river.

“The region was prone to health pandemic as a result of constant dumping of both solid and liquid domestic waste and industrial toxic waste into the river”, she said, adding, “this would lead to the deterioration of water quality, ground water pollution - which might also arise from mining activities -deforestation and flooding transport sediments into water bodies”.

Then there is the fear of a decrease in water volume in the region, which the governments of Nigeria, Niger and Mali are constantly talking about. A major decrease could lead to conflicts over electricity generation and increase in toxicity caused by decreasing dilution.

“There will be loss of jobs and livelihood, loss of biodiversity, displacement of fishing communities and localisation of conflicts,’’ Mye-Kamara said.

Randolph Kent, the Kings College’s Director of Humanitarian Programme however warned that the west African sub-region lacked the capacity to cope with the envisaged calamities.

“The region’s humanitarian sector faces difficulties in anticipating and responding adequately to emerging crisis,” he said. “This is due, in part, to the ways in which many organisations within the sector thinks.

“Population growth, mass migration, global warming, natural resource scarcity, toxic waste, social inequality and outmoded institutions are just some of the stark trends and factors that humankind must face; but, here in West Africa, confronting these is still a challenge”, he said.

He cautioned that the strategic capabilities of most organisations within the sub-region were uneven and that their focus is generally narrow and short-term.

An official of the ECOWAS Commission confessed as much. Mohammed Ibrahim, the Principal Programme Officer, Disaster Risk Reduction at the Commission said the region was at the cross road regarding how to prevent what could be one of the greatest humanitarian crisis of this century.

Mr. Ibrahim said that all the scenarios presented by scientists on the possibility of a possible disaster have started manifesting, as the sea current now was stronger than it uses to be.
He, however, said the Commission has the requisite organs to articulate viable options and strategies to mitigate the possible disasters.

Mr. Agboola, however, said the sub-region has to rely on indigenous knowledge to overcome any disaster. But the experts all agreed on one thing: the creation of a platform that would bring policy makers and scientists in the region together to find solutions to the envisaged crisis.