NOSDRA to launch national oil spill monitor

The Director General NOSDRA, Sir Peter Idabor, stated this over the weekend in Abuja during a two-day retreat organized for the agency’s governing board and management staff.He said the oil spill monitor is a webpage that would enhance the involvement of host communities and others to play their own roles in enhancing quick response to […]

The Director General NOSDRA, Sir Peter Idabor, stated this over the weekend in Abuja during a two-day retreat organized for the agency’s governing board and management staff.
He said the oil spill monitor is a webpage that would enhance the involvement of host communities and others to play their own roles in enhancing quick response to emergencies by the agency.
Idabor said the agency is collaborating with the oil companies and stakeholders’ development network and other NGOs to have the platform which will help to link the agency to host communities to address the problem of oil spill.
He commented on the issue of amending NOSDRA act, commending the efforts of the National Assembly and House Committee on Environment on expediting the process. He said, the need for effectiveness of the law is very important.
“To regulate the oil industry or matter relating to spill, the issue is, how effective these laws are, do the laws come with punishment, those are the factors we need to address,” he said.
He added that it is important to ensure that they provide adequate punishment to any kind of default created by the operation so that when the law is amended, it will have much impact and will be able to stop menace of oil spillage in the country.
The chairman of NOSDRA governing board, Major Lancelot Anyanya in his keynote address said the retreat was to understand the core mandate of the agency and to create the synergy of understanding between the board’s role as policy makers and policy guardians and that of management staff as policy executors and implementers.
Anyanya added that as a government regulation and service provider, the agency is placed to speak on remedies from appropriate quarters to address what is clearly the most compelling imperative for our national survival, economy, prosperity and national security.
He, however, said the next frontier for NOSDRA to conquer is to ensure lasting peace and security in Niger Delta and to find from there, the resources to mobilize collective energy alternation to focus on those challenges that confront the country by addressing the issue of oil spillage and the relationship between the environment and the resources it gives us on a sustainable bases.
The chairman, while commending the Senate and House committee on environment on work done on the process of amending the legislative framework, urged them to conclude the process in due time.