Okaba-Odagbo Coal: 84 years, after a community sitting on black gold wallows in poverty

As a school boy in the early 1980s in the then Benue State, the name of Okaba was more popular among the pupils than Makurdi, the state capital. Reason being that Okaba sits on a huge coal deposit with flourishing coal-mining and exploration activities. Our teacher, Mr Raphael Okeme, fondly referred to it in our […]

As a school boy in the early 1980s in the then Benue State, the name of Okaba was more popular among the pupils than Makurdi, the state capital. Reason being that Okaba sits on a huge coal deposit with flourishing coal-mining and exploration activities. Our teacher, Mr Raphael Okeme, fondly referred to it in our Social Study class with a great sense of pride.

Many years after school, I still hold a mental image of Okaba as an old coal mining community. I was also under an illusion that the place must have been transformed into a modern town, courtesy of mining activities.

In the euphoria of this imagination, I set out on a trip to this popular mining community with great expectations. I defied the early January cold weather, hired a motor bike that ferried me from my last bus stop, Emere junction, to Odagbo.

We took off from Emere junction and before long, we were at Okaba junction-along the Ankpa-Adoka-Makurdi high way.  We veered off the tarred road and took the narrow path leading to Okaba. As we meandered between potholes on the once tarred road, I kept looking out for a sign board that could point to my destination, the Okaba coal mining site. But I couldn’t find any until we were out of Okaba.

Repeatedly, I asked my co-traveller, the commercial motorcyclist, whether he was sure of the road, just as we kept dogging the dregs of tar, that could only remind the road user that the road was once tarred.

Suddenly, we came to a junction where the road divides into two. One to the west and another to the east. It was at this point that I told the bike rider that I was going to Okaba coal mining site. He said okay, that means you are going to Odagbo- I said, no I was going to Okaba coal mining site. He said ‘don’t worry we are going there.’

He turned and faced westward, where an arrow indicated Odagbo, and the one facing the eastward indicated Onupi. I held my breath as we took a narrower road to Odagbo, and the residual coal tar on the road was more daring with grown grasses and trees overlooking the narrow path leading to the community, that is literally sitting on black gold.

I wondered – could it be that I was in the wrong place? But I dispelled the suggestion. Not with the kind of assurance I got from my co-traveler. About five minutes from Okaba, we got to Odagbo-Ogane. The village is on the plain and as we rode, descending slowly into a stream which is named Aji-Achokpa, the mental image of Okaba coal which I carried for nearly 30 years began to fade, and the reality began to stare me in the face. I asked my okada rider to stop intermittently, to enable me take pictures of some sites.

From Aji-Achokpa, where some persons were bathing, we began to ascend a hilly segment of the narrow road leading to the Odagbo centre, where the coal is deposited. But the effect of erosion threatening the community, became visible when we crossed a narrow bridge on Aji-Achokpa. Both sides of the road are under threats of gully erosion, an indication that the road is even sitting on a time bomb.

Before I could take pictures   of the erosion sites, we were at Odagbo where the coal mine is. We stopped close to where some persons gathered around a woman in the hot sun. When we got close, I discovered that the woman was selling cooked rice, and the people, young and old, formed a ring around her to make purchases.

There, we asked for the way to the coal mining site. A teenager responded in a polite and respectful manner, and in a mode of English    which suggested that he is poorly schooled.

When I noticed his difficulty in the use of English language, I code switched instantly to speak the language of the community. He became more excited and willing to help. The young man, who later told me his name was Abdul, showed me the direction of the road to the abandoned coal mining site. But he later took me to another person who could either speak to me on the coal, or allow me go into the abandoned mining site.

It was in that office that I met two angry men who took me round the mining site, where I saw the devastative impact of the mining activities on the community’s eco system.  But a cross-section of the locals told this reporter that their story was that of a people sitting on riches but poor, as miners mined away their fortunes and left them in want. The people are most pained by what they called loss   of identity. The coal is identified with Okaba, which is some two kilometers away from Odagbo, on which soil the coal is deposited.

Some 84 years ago (1927), when Pa Oruma Onyega discovered that Efakwu-Odagbo was sitting on coal, and in commercial quantity,  the community rolled out drums, celebrating   nature’s gift to the people. The joy of the community was premised on an expectation that in a few years time, the story of the sleepy farming settlements and its people, would change for the better.

In that euphoria, the white men were invited to assess the coal deposit, believing then that the mining of the coal would be swift, and the exploration of their resources would transform the depleted fortunes of the community. The white men had promised that mining activities would commence at the site without delay, a promise which heightened the expectations of the people. But they had to wait for another 41 years (1968) before the mining activity could begin.

The commencement of mining in Odagbo, four decades after the discovery of the coal deposit, was rather circumstantial than by design. The situation epitomizes the cliché that one man’s food is another man’s poison. While the people of Odagbo and Okaba were waiting endlessly for the mining of their coal to begin, the Enugu coal mining was flourishing, and no one cared whether such resources existed in any other part of the country.

But the government and the people suddenly realized that coal existed in Odagbo as it was later known and called, when the Nigeria civil war that broke out in 1967 peaked and the mining activities in Enugu nosedived. So, in 1968, mining of a coal deposit discovered in 1927 began with a lot of promises to the people on whose soil the coal lay.

But as mining activities progressed into weeks, months and years, the lofty promises and the great expectations of the people became mere illusions. The coal miners continued to mine away fortunes from the land, and in return, left the people in excruciating poverty, and at the mercy of all kinds of environmental degradation.

For instance, chemicals from the mining site got into three of their streams, namely Aji-Omoda, Aji-Achokpa and Aji-Otakpa contaminated, killing all the fishes and made it unhealthy for human consumption.  At the early stage of the mining activities when the chemicals spilled into the drinking water sources, it was gathered that many people died after drinking water from the affected streams.

The coal mining company also promised to reclaim the land after exploration, to make the land useful for farming. But it never did, hence, what became the lot of the people are highlands and gullies, resulting from the unclaimed lands.

The only new thing that happened as the people could recall was environmental degradation in an endemic proportion, loss of identity and shattered dreams and promises. They are pained that the mining activities that were supposed to have brought socio-economic transformation their way brought more worries instead.

Among the ten verbal agreements reached with the miners, none was met before the mining operations in the area folded up. The only infrastructure the community could point at as one benefit from the mining, is the provision of   rural electricity. Even at that, they got only one phase of the three phases promised them.

In what sounded like lamentation, the Senior Gago of Odagbo, Chief Abubakar Amedu, told this reporter   “take a look at my house. Look at the entire village or the road on which you travelled down here, can you point at anything that suggests that the community is sitting on coal? We are being cheated, they mined away fortunes from here, but they left the people and the village in penury”

He maintained, “the annoying thing is that our village even lost its identity in the process. You passed through Okaba on your way here, did you see coal in Okaba? But it is  Okaba that  bears the name,  but the coal mine is right here in Odagbo. That is part of the grand conspiracy against our people.”

According to him, when the coal mining operation started, the Okaba elite took advantage of his people who were barely educated, and did not have people in the then military government.

He said one of the Okaba sons who was in the then government masterminded the naming of Okaba with the coal mine, explaining that when the name came up, the community protested but they were suppressed.

He wondered why Okaba should have the name while the resource was in Odagbo. “Okaba has Gago, Odagbo has Gago, Okaba is under Ojokwu and Odagbo is under Ojokwu. How come Ojokwu does not have the name, and Okaba is claiming the name.”

Chief Amedu said his people lost their farmlands to the mining activities, but there was no single compensation to the people, adding that even the community’s drinking water sources (streams) were contaminated by the mining chemicals which spilled into the streams.

“Our major craft in this community is farming and our lands farms, and economic trees have been destroyed. The water is no longer healthy for drinking, and the fishes in our streams are all gone. We have been managing life since, and pray that the government will remember us. We are peace loving people,  and we are not against mining companies coming to mine, but they must be ready to dialogue with us and  they must use the name of Odagbo  and not Okaba any longer” he said.

He said the unfortunate part of the story was the abrupt collapse of the mining activities by the government, adding that the government sold off all the facilities at the site, without recourse to the people.

Prince Mohammed Lawal Oruma, founder of Odagbo Youth Forum Association, corroborated the senior Gago, recalling that it was in 1968 when the civil war forced mining operation at the Enugu site to a close, that mining activities began at Odagbo.

He recalled that when the first mining company, FCG came in 1967, the company was merely using the name of Ankpa, being the local government headquarters for the purpose of correspondence, until the Nigerian Mining Corporation took over the coal mining.

The youth leader said it was in the 70s that the name was changed to Okaba coal, a development which ignited series of protest by the Odagbo elders. But their protest never yielded any result, as their voices were suppressed by other interested persons from Okaba, who had the ears of the government.

Some years later, when the young had grown, they dusted the matter, using all available avenues to register their displeasure over the name which they said was misleading.

Oruma said, “when our population of educated youths from Odagbo grew and the awareness increased, the youth rose up to the challenges and insisted that the name must be changed from Okaba coal to Odagbo. We pushed the matter to a reasonable stage, and we resolved that if the name of Okaba must remain then Odagbo should be added. Then it became Okaba-Odagbo coal mine.”

Asked about what the community had benefited from the coal exploration and exploitation in the community, he said miners left the community and the people worse than they met it.

According to him, the miners had oral agreement with the community, but at the end of the day, none of the agreements and promises were fulfilled.

“We had oral agreement with the miners that after the exploration, land should be reclaimed. They agreed that they will give us boreholes in place of our polluted drinking water sources. They also promised to establish a Colliery Secondary School in the village, as well as an hospital. They promised to give us electricity, reconstruction of the only road linking the community from Ochinobi to Odagbo. Others include yearly 10% royalty to the community, and scholarship to some individuals from the locality to study Mining Engineering in higher institutions of learning. But the only thing they did was electricity phase one. Phase two and three were still being expected   before the collapse of the mining industry.

He said the past management of the company refused to sink boreholes, even when they had done feasibility studies and money was released for the project. The struggle was on to get it done before the Nigerian Mining Corporation collapsed, and coal mining activities were closed.

According to him, following the privatization of the mining corporation by the Bureau for Public Enterprises (BPE), the entire company’s properties were auctioned out to people and no member of the community was given any.

The youth leader regretted the federal government’s decision to close mining activities in the area, when it stands to benefit from the coal deposits in the area.

He said the coal discovered at Odagbo was about 72 billion tons, adding that since the mining started in the area, only about 300 million tons were mined, adding that when the mining activities were on, coal mined from Odagbo were labelled Enugu.

According to him, the coal at Odagbo is open cast, unlike that of Enugu which is underground. “In Enugu, they have to deal with the surface before getting the coal, but the Odagbo own is open cast. Enugu uses our coal and puts the name of Enugu.”

Malam Salifu Adejoh, an elder from Odagbo, told this reporter that when the coal mining company adopted Okaba, the community protested and refused to identify with it, adding that they youths almost went violent, but were persuaded by the elders to let peace reign.

He regretted that since then, nothing has been done to assuage the community before the mining corporation closed shop. Adejoh noted that, ‘But no water to drink, our farmlands are depleted and we have been appealing, but nothing is being done.”

According to the retired army officer, “we will not stop anybody from coming to mine the coal.  But the host community must be given what is due to it. Our land is not reclaimed. We depend on water tankers for drinkable water. There is   no school and no healthcare centre in the entire community.”

Pained by the unhealthy way the previous coal mining activities were handled, a group, the Igala Advancement Foundation, had rejected the federal government’s Environmental Impact Assessment on the mining operations in Igala land, as published in some dailies in October 2009.

The group, in the letter of rejection and recommendations to the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Environment, Mabushi, Abuja, said the issues raised in the EIA were vague and none committing.

The letter signed by the Rowland Ocholi Ataguba, acknowledged the efforts of the government to carry out the assessment, but faulted the outcome on many grounds, and made some recommendations on how best the mining activities could benefit the government and the host communities.

It recommended that the ministry should begin the process of establishing a regulatory architecture for the mining industry, including fair rules of engagement of mining enterprises with host communities and the design, implementation and monitoring of the process. Once in place, compliance must be strictly enforced.

Also, gas emission and air pollution control should be approached using the BACT for a guide. “Ultimately, emphasis should be on the use of clean technologies for coal-mining which are now available.

For the control of dust: “provision of deep well water supply and treatment plants for water from streams and rivers, not only for the community use but to help reduce the effects of contamination from runoffs  due to the overall mining activities. In addition, ambient air monitoring stations are recommended at the mining sites and at the mining communities and surrounding towns and villages. Daily weather observations to determine wind directions from the mining sites are essential to effectively monitor communities that are exposed as a result of the wind drift”

For the control of run-offs to avoid water and soil pollution: the company should engage in active re-vegetation of exposed soil surface. Not only would this lead to reduced dust and particulate matter, but will check erosion and runoffs into the streams and rivers. In addition, the vegetation would help in restoring and absorbing toxic chemicals that are used in the process of mining.

Ataguba, in the letter, also recommended that the Kogi State government should establish structures necessary to make coal-mining and exploration activities in Igalaland a rewarding experience for all Igala. “To this end, the government should assist the host communities to negotiate a fair and mutually rewarding agreement with the investor.”

Speaking on the plight of the people in the coal-mining community, the Majority leader of the Kogi State House of Assembly, Barrister Adamu Mohammed, said, “I feel very bad and I see it as a conspiracy against the minority ethnic groups in Nigeria.”

He said, “as a member of the Kogi House of Assembly, I was once Chairman of House Committee on Mineral Resources, and that made me very conversant with the coal mine. The negative impact of mining on the people of the area is something to cry about.”

The lawmaker said when coal mining was going on, the miners would move coal from Odagbo-Okaba to Enugu and claim that it was the product of Enugu coal.  He added, “this is part of the conspiracy theory I talked about.”

He maintained that the most painful aspect was that the Odagbo coal and Aguya in Ankpa, were discovered to be one of the best in the world, adding that it was believed that the conspiracy against the people has confused the government about the fact.

If not, while South Africa is depending on power from coal, Nigeria is foot-dragging in that direction. Is it not because of the accident of location? If it were in Enugu, Kano or Ibadan, would they have ignored it? I feel bad as a conscience of my people. The implication is that the Igala nation and the north central is feeling bad about the scenario.”