Bayelsa communities watch livelihoods drown as new oil leak goes unchecked

By Samuel Oyadongha

IKENSI—Just weeks after a marine spill hit the Atlantic coastline near Okpoama, Diema and Twon Brass in Brass Local Government Area, a crude pipeline rupture near Ikensi in Nembe Local Government Area has residents fearing for their survival.  

Oil is now flowing freely into their drinking water and fishing grounds.  

The spill, NDV learned, was noticed last Thursday. It was exactly 6:45 a.m. when fishermen in Ikensi community realised the sheen on the creek was not a trick of the morning sun but an underwater crude oil pipeline, belonging to Aiteo Eastern Exploration and Production Limited, was leaking.  

“Crude oil is still flowing into our waterways,” said Chief Clarkson Obiakpa, a traditional leader in Opu Nembe Kingdom, his voice heavy with a dread that has become all too regular. “No response team has arrived. Our rivers, fishing grounds, and drinking sources are already being affected.”  

For residents of the mangroves, the river is not just water. It is where they fish and find drinking water. It is how they feed their families. And right now, it is under threat.  

A double blow to a fragile coast  

A few weeks ago, the neighbouring Brass Local Government Area was reeling from a catastrophic marine spill along the Atlantic coastline. In that incident, a burst hose during a crude transfer between a vessel and a tanker owned by Aiteo reportedly sent large volumes of oil surging into the sea. The spill smothered the waters near Okpoama, Diema, and Twon-Brass, choking aquatic biodiversity and devastating the nets of local fishermen.  

Chief Edwin Otiete-Goli, chairman of the Community Development Committee in Okpoama, said: “This spill has devastated our waters and our means of livelihood. Our fishing grounds are polluted, and our ecosystem is under serious threat. We call for immediate accountability, full remediation, and justice for our people who depend entirely on these waters for survival.”  

Instead of remediation, residents of Ikensi now fear they will simply be added to the same long, tragic list.  

The people of Nembe and Brass Kingdoms were promised that such a horror would never happen again. They were told that the operator would transition away from risky marine vessel transport to safer pipeline-based evacuation systems. That promise, residents lamented, now feels like a lie.  

“We are deeply concerned about our survival,” Chief Obiakpa repeated, staring at the slick overtaking his ancestral waters.  

The ghost of Santa Barbara  

Since Aiteo took over operatorship of OML 29 from Shell Petroleum Development Company in 2015, the area has been a patchwork of ecological wounds.  

None cuts deeper than the Santa Barbara Well 1 blowout on November 1, 2021, the locals told NDV.  

For 38 agonising days, crude oil and gas spewed uncontrollably into the environment.  

Bayelsa State Governor, Senator Douye Diri, called it one of the worst environmental disasters in the Niger Delta, comparing its magnitude only to the infamous Gulf of Mexico spill.  

Now, with two more spills in quick succession, residents feel they are living in the eye of the storm. “We’re tired of being forgotten,” one fisherman in Okpoama said. “If the water dies, we die with it.”  

No official statement from the oil firm or the national oil spill regulator had been released as of press time, but it was learned that the JIV involving the operator, regulator and community representatives took place on Saturday to ascertain the cause of the leak.

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