This mass poisoning recorded in 2012 in Ndokwa-East Local Government Area of the oil-rich state exposed the underbelly of the flood disaster management and victims’ rehabilitation committees set up by the State in the wake of a ravaging flood that washed away homes, farmlands, roads, bridges, markets and businesses across 22 states of the federation.
With corrupt government officials routinely diverting cash, food and relief materials meant for disaster victims, the survivors were left with little recourse but to feast on the only thing that was supplied in abundance – the pesticide treated corn seeds doled out to victims, in addition to cassava stems, to encourage them to begin a new planting year.
Overnight, hundreds of people in communities like Ossissa, Isele-Egwu, Olor and Onu-Aboh were left looking gaunt with bloated tummies and sunken eyes, forcing families who could afford it to rush their sick members to hospitals while others resorted to prayer houses.
The 2012 flood disaster in Nigeria remains one of the harshest spinoffs of climate change in sub-Saharan Africa. Delta was one of the 22 states ravaged by flood after neighbouring Cameroon was forced to release water from its Ladgo Dam, leading to an unprecedented overflow of many rivers, especially Niger and Benue. Hundreds of kilometers of urban and rural land in those states were inundated by flood.
According to the Post-Disaster Needs Assessment Report of the National Emergency Agency (NEMA) 363 lives were lost, thousands of livestock drowned, over two million people displaced and N2.29 trillion worth of properties and economic means washed off.
Delta received N500 million intervention fund from the Federal Government to assist flood victims in the state. This was in addition to internal funds already set aside by the oil-rich state for the same purpose. In one of his numerous speeches during the crisis period, the then governor of the state, Emmanuel Uduaghan, announced the allocation of 49 trucks of food items to internally-displaced people in the state but it didn’t appear that those eating pesticide-treated corn seedlings saw any of the food trucks. A cash relief of N5,000 to adults and N3,000 to youths was equally announced but the monies instead went into private pockets.
Mr. Alexander Nwanji, a farmer and cassava-mill entrepreneur trained by ActionAid in Good Governance and Citizens Participation told PREMIUM TIMES that nobody in his Ossissa community received any cash or food items. Official records had it that 11,810 internally displaced persons were took refuge at the Oleh camp alone in Isoko Local Government Area of the state.
It is difficult to say how many, if any, received the cash payment. But with three kids fed with only one packet of noodle, the disaffection and neglect in the camp was such that the IDPs began to “discharge themselves” from the camp.
In the face of starvation, many abandoned the camp in search of friends and families to take them in.
The next time the governor came calling, the same thieving officials who had diverted foods and pocketed cash meant for the displaced persons told him that they had successfully helped most of the flood victims to return home. The number of people left in the camp was only 3,640.
If the governor smelt a rat he did not say it. However, in the course of yet another speech before television camera, he found it necessary to throw in this:
“I beg you in the name of God do not short-change or divert these materials to other persons or channel them for personal use. Let them get what they are supposed to get because that is why we have trust in you,” the governor said.
Alluding again to widespread official corruption, this time in the data collation of flood victims, Mr. Uduaghan would at another location plead against the falsification of data and using same for personal gains.
The governor was directing his words at members of the Flood Fund Management Committee, political appointees and state lawmakers who had invented clever ways to make fortunes out of the pervading misery.
Alexander Nwanji, a victim, told PREMIUM TIMES that although he lost both his farm and cassava mill, his name didn’t appear on the official list of farmers to receive post disaster assistance. He also did not get the N5,000 meant for adult IDPs. He accused politicians and government officials of populating the list with ghost beneficiaries, adding that the 11,810 IDPs at the Oleh camp alone were robbed of about N59 million.
Other people who told this newspaper they got nothing from the flood relief funds included Larry Onyia of Ashaka village and Benjamin Ogbogu of Igbukwu village who said the only thing he got was a mattress and that that came from an oil company operating in his community.
Officials in Delta were evasive when this newspaper sought their comments on the administration of the N500million relief fund the state received from the federal government.
The State Ministry of Environment wouldn’t provide information in respect of the utilisation of the funds. Rather, its spokesperson, Anita Ohagwa, directed enquiries to the Bureau of Special Duties under the Governor’s office, where the spokesperson, a woman who would not give her name, said, “we had nothing to do with flood relief funds. Go to the Emergency Management Agency.”
However, the Director of the Emergency Management Agency said he was new on the job and could not comment on the utilisation of the funds.
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