EIA violation: Govt is biggest culprit
In the last few years, the country has witnessed an unprecedented investment in projects targeted at enhancing the economic status of the country. However, it is regrettable that governments, at various levels, in the course of establishing these projects, ignored the mandatory Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA).
Globally, EIA has become recognised as a tool for achieving sustainable development with the objective of ensuring that potential environmental impacts are foreseen at the appropriate stage of project design and addressed before any decision is taken on the project.
According to Greener Journal of Environmental Management and Public Safety volume 11, the EIA involves a systematic process for identifying, predicting and evaluating potential impacts associated with a development project.
“The EIA process must proffer mitigation measures to avoid, reduce or minimize the negative impacts on the environment, public health and property and may highlight the foreseeable positive impacts,” the journal said.
The EIA is not a one-off process which terminates in the production of a report on the effects of the project and associated mitigation measures. It also deals with monitoring the construction and operational phases and this continues till the project is decommissioned. The post-closure care is also an integral part of the EIA process.
In Nigeria, the EIA Decree 86 of 1992 is regarded in many quarters as one of the best crafted laws Nigeria has ever made in the bid to protect the environment. But over the years, its implementation has left much to be desired as it is being flouted and not taken into consideration in the construction or establishment of major projects.
The Decree has the aim of protecting the Nigerian environment. It is particularly directed at regulating the industrialisation process with due regard to the environment.
By this Decree, no industrial plan/development/activity can be executed without prior consideration of the environmental consequences of such a proposed action, in the form of an environmental impact assessment.
An investigation by Daily Trust on the administration of EIA in Nigeria has revealed that the assessment continues to be flouted indiscriminately by developers, especially government agencies.
Chris O. Nwoko of the Department of Environmental Technology, Federal University of Technology, Owerri, said that despite a sound legal basis and comprehensive guidelines, evidence suggests that EIA has not yet evolved satisfactorily in Nigeria.
He said: “An evaluation of the EIA system against systematic evaluation criteria, based on interviews with EIA approval authorities, consulting firms and experts, reveals various shortcomings of the EIA system. These mainly include inadequate capacity of EIA approval authorities, deficiencies in screening and scoping, poor EIA quality, inadequate public participation and weak monitoring.
“Overall, most EIA study rarely meets the objective of being a project planning tool to contribute to achieving sustainable development and mitigate impact from development
Overall, most EIA study rarely meets the objective of being a project planning tool to contribute to achieving sustainable development and mitigate impact from development project.”
project.”
Speaking on the development, Mr Kehinde Odusanya, Acting Director, Environment Assessment Department at the Federal Ministry of Environment, said that the EIA act is being reviewed in the ministry, adding that the outcome may be a subject for discussion at a stakeholders workshop to be organised by the ministry. The public may also be involved at the appropriate time, he said.
He said: “When a project starts before getting the EIA, they will be fined between N50, 000 to N1million. Usually, we have an agency that enforces the EIA, that is NESREA, that also goes around to check all major development projects whether they have the EIA approval or not. If they don’t have, they sometimes close down those facilities and fine them or take them to court. NESREA is our enforcement agency, they have the power to enforce the law and go round to check the projects and they are doing it very well.”
Odusanyo noted that most developers lacked awareness on EIA while others “don’t want to comply and that is why we have NESREA enforcing the law.”
He said that the major challenge facing the EIA administration in the country is in the area of enforcement. He added: “Because, generally, people want to circumvent the law and the next one is that in the public sector, most government projects do not usually incorporate the EIA of their project into the budget. So, you find out that when they start and NESREA goes to ask for the EIA, they will start to run here and there and claim they have to do their EIA.”
He noted the need to step up awareness campaign and enforcement while government projects should cover the EIA cost in their budgets.