A destroyed refinery By Favour Ifeoluwa & Akinola Ajibade The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited( NNPCL) says it has destroyed 134 illegal refineries in the last few weeks. Also, the company said 63 illegal pipeline connections were uncovered during the the weeks . The corporation, In a visual report, stated that at about 2 am on Sunday, a joint team of security agents discovered a large wooden boat illicitly loading stolen crude oil from Barge AGS01 within the OML 18 operating area, noted intelligence report a large wooden wooden boat was caught receiving crude oil from the barge. According to the state-owned oil firm, while the barge was towed away with a tugboat in custody, five speedboats used in towing the large wooden boat to the illegal loading site were also detained and the particulars of the tugboats and barge used for the operation were reportedly seized for further investigation. It further said that two large boats, which involve
Buildings submerged by floods
By Favour Ajibade
Nigeria will experience a more distaatrous flooding incident in 2023, the Director General, National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), Mustapha Abeeb Muhammed, has said.
He attributed the floods that are being experienced in many parts of Nigeria, due to the refusal of state governors to heed the earlier warnings of impending floods in 2022.
He spoke on recently when he appeared before the Senate Committee on Special Duties led by Senator Yusuf Yusuf ( APC Taraba state) to defend the 2023 budget proposal of his agency .
He urged governments at all levels to prepare the challenges ahead by establishing local emergency committees to mitigate the devastating impacts of floods and other disasters across the country.
“Despite the fact that states are collecting Ecological and other intervention funds from the Federal G0overnment, some of them could not boost the standing committee on disaster management and when there is a disaster they look up to the federal government for assistance”, he said.
He added that before the 2022 flood disaster, NEMA wrote about four letters to all states of the federation on the need to set up a local emergency committee to mitigate the impact of floods but only four states heeded the warning.
He disclosed a bottom-up approach in disaster management where the local government is the first respondent followed by the state and if it is beyond what the state can handle, the federal government can then come on board.
“But it is surprising that if there is any disaster, local governments and states look up to NEMA without first providing preliminary support and the manpower and resources at the disposal of NEMA is nothing to write home about. Even what happened in Bayelsa and other states in term casualties can be prevented or minimised if proper arrangements are made” he said
The Senate Committee on Special Duties decried poor budgetary allocation to NEMA and promised to come up with a legislation that would put the agency under the presidency for optimum performance.
It also urged NEMA to get the states engaged and ensure that there are proper plans for people displaced by floods.
“It is high time NEMA go beyond distributing rice, beans and blankets to victims of flood but ensure that you partner with state governments to set up camps for flood victims ” Senator Lilian Ekwunife
Earlier, NEMA boss told the committee that only N774 million is earmarked as capital vote for the agency in 2023, N1.77 billion for personnel cost while a sum of N162 million is proposed for overhead cost in 2023 budget.
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