The Ecological Action Advocacy Foundation (TEAAF) Calls for Urgent Intervention in Gelegele Community; We are losing our sights by the Day says Gelegele people

A Press Briefing to the Edo State Government and Other Stakeholders on the Health Impacts of Gas Flaring on the Gelegele People, 07th February 2025.

The Ecological Action Advocacy Foundation (TEAAF), in Benin City, Edo State on Tuesday 21st January 2025 has called on the Edo State Governor, Sen Monday Okpebhole, and the Management of Dubril Oil Company (Owners of the Oil installation working in the community) to come to as a matter of urgency attend to the health emergency needs of the people of Gelegele community.  

In a statement made available to the Press today 7th February 2025 by the Communications Manager Omozuwa E. Ugbogbo, stated that the people of Gelegele, a coastal community in Edo State, have for years endured the devastating health and environmental consequences of gas flaring from oil exploration activities in the region. As concerned stakeholders, we call on the Edo State Government to take immediate and decisive action to address this public health crisis and safeguard the well-being of the affected communities.

According to Omozuwa "The Press statement was necessitated by the recent program carried out in the community titled Building the Resilience of Gelegele Community people against gas flaring. The project had as one of its activities a health audit and assessments of the impacts of gas flaring in the lives and livelihoods of the Gelegele community people" mostly impacted are women and children. 

During the health audit and medical outreach, free medical care and drugs were given to the people, and eye tests and checks were carried out as well. The medical experts who were present (Opticians, Paramedics, Pharmacists, Nurses, and Paediatricians) observed that Gas flaring has caused a lot of damage to the health of the people, aside from the health impacts it has also affected the means of livelihood of the people and their mental health. 

The experts observed that over 98% of the Gelegele community people are affected by Cataracts most especially the elderlies, an eyesight problem caused by the impacts of gas flaring (constant exposure to light both night and day) and most of them are rapidly going blind and are in dire need of urgent eye care and surgery because if this is not done in the next few years more than half of the community people would have gone blind.

“The Health and socio-economic situation of the Gelegele People is in dire need of urgent intervention, so far what we have seen in the community is not something that a single organization can do alone, the people are suffering and from what we observed while carrying our intervention is that more than half of the population in the community are going blind, the government and the oil company need to do the needful urgently" Ajirioghene Offi, Program Director TEAAF.

"Living in Gelegele has been a constant struggle. The gas flaring has polluted our air and water, causing endless health problems. I've seen friends and family suffer from respiratory diseases,skin conditions and eye problems. The lack of access to medical care and specialized services like eye surgery has made our situation even more desperate. We urgently need medical attention and support to alleviate our suffering and improve our quality of life. We are almost going blind."Comrade Cynthia Buluebiere Bright, Director GWEDO

"About 30% of the elderly are faced with visual(sight) impairments the other 30% are faced with both visual( sight) impairments & skin irritation all as a result of the effect of gas flaring while the remaining 40% are faced with hypertension, diabetes, visual impairments and skin irritation and a good number of the middle-aged about 70% are largely affected by skin irritations, while the remaining 30% are affected by both skin irritations, visual impairments and some had hypertension as well. The children are faced with infections like malaria, sepsis, skin irritation which are due to the unhealthy and unhygienic environment polluted by gas emissions, thus most children come with respiratory-related illnesses, gastroenteritis, and all these illnesses are easily transmitted to children when the environment is unfavorable. 

The Gelegele people need urgent and consistent medical and environmental rehabilitation". Dr. Avabore Nicholas  a senior medical officer at Benin Medical Care, Modic Medical Center.

“The effect of the gas flaring from the oil exploration company has an adverse effect on the oculat health conditions of the Indigenous community.

The prevalence of cataracts most especially for individuals between the ages of 45 and above, was seen during the course of the outreach program. 

About 90% of the population between the ages of 50 and above have cataracts and 95% of the population between 40 and above need prescribed glasses. There is a need for a better health care system and a cataract outreach screening to aid the failing eye health of the community members.

Overall, it was an impactful outreach’’. Dr. Dingwo Healson and Dr. Edemu Precious, Opticians UBTH

From our research, observation, and based on scientific evidence we have seen that gas flaring releases harmful pollutants, including carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and volatile organic compounds harmful to the environment.

Environmental and Socioeconomic Impacts

Beyond health implications, gas flaring has also caused severe environmental degradation, leading to soil infertility, water contamination, and biodiversity loss. These challenges have exacerbated poverty and food insecurity within the Gelegele community, which largely depends on fishing and farming for livelihood.

Our demands 

We hereby demand that the 

1. Implementation of Strict Regulations: Enforce existing environmental laws and ensure oil companies operating in the region adopt cleaner technologies and best practices.

2.  Health Intervention Programs:  Establish medical outreach programs to provide healthcare services and early detection of gas flare-related illnesses in the community.

3. Urgent Environmental Remediation Efforts: Urge Dubril oil to relocate, put off the gas flare stack  or re-inject the flared gases  and initiate clean-up projects and introduce sustainable solutions to restore the environment and support affected livelihoods.

4.   More Community Engagement and Awareness: Educate the people of Gelegele on the health risks of gas flaring and empower them with knowledge on how to mitigate exposure.

5. Collaborate with Federal Agencies: Work with relevant federal bodies to hold oil companies accountable and ensure compliance with environmental standards.

The time to act is now. The health and future of the Gelegele people should not be compromised for industrial gains. We trust the Edo State Government will rise to the occasion and prioritize the welfare of its citizens.

Signed

The Ecological Action Advocacy Foundation (TEAAF) 

Omozuwa E. U, Communications Manager. 

Email: ecoactors@yahoo.com

Gas Flaring: A grave threat to health and livelihood in Niger Delta

Traveling deep into the heart of the Niger Delta typical oil producing communities you will physically experience a burning sensation on your skin as though a massive fire has been ignited all around the environment and the temperature ranges between 30-35 degrees Celsius each day.

The experiences are more or less like that of a roasted meat in an over heated oven. Frankly speaking, these communities are indeed been roasted daily by the massive flames from stacks setup by petrochemical companies located in the heart of the Niger Delta communities.

This high temperatures arises as a result of gas flares stacks used in burning off natural gases during crude oil extraction and refining processing in other to give way for the liquefied petroleum products to be refined. Some of the communities which bear most of the impacts of gas flaring are those communities located around flow stations and petrochemical refineries.

Sometimes in these communities they experience carbon soot in their environment which poses grave dangers and health threats to the inhabitants of the community most especially to the infants and children whose respiratory tracts are too tender to cope with toxic air pollution substances. That is the main reasons why, dry cough, asthma, bronchitis, and lung cancer are some of the most common respiratory diseases which are more evident in host communities in the region.

Nigeria’s Niger Delta region has been known over the years to have in abundance natural gas which comes along with crude oil during extraction, but the fact remains that the gases are not been utilized properly rather they are burnt off as gas flares thereby causing untold hardship for host communities located around these productions and refining sites.

Presently natural gas is been flared in Nigeria more than anywhere else in the world. Estimates are notoriously unreliable, but roughly 2.5 billion cubic feet of gas associated with crude oil is wasted in this way every day in. Nigeria is flaring about 40% of produced gas and re-injecting just 12% to enhance oil recovery during extraction processes.

For clearer understanding, the term Gas flaring connotes the burning of natural gas and petroleum hydrocarbons in flare stacks by upstream oil companies in oil fields during operations. Gas flaring is the singular and most common source of global warming and contributes to emissions of carbon monoxide, nitrogen(II) oxide and methane which have the propensity of causing environmental pollution and ecological disturbances or destruction.

Gas flaring has lead to series of untold hardship in host communities such as the emergence of health challenges, food shortages, and infertility among other things. Still with these impacts community women in their ignorance, still go ahead to process their local food by the side of these flare stacks because they feel the heat from the flares dries their product quicker than then heat generated from sunlight, but unknowingly to them the flares produced are very toxic in nature, containing various forms of carbon monoxides, Carbon dioxide, methane and Sulfur oxides which causes global warming and at the same time are harmful to their health.

Visiting some of these communities you will see children playing and dancing by the gas flares sites while their mothers dry up the fishes they caught from their polluted rivers and stream and others drying up their cassava flakes commonly called kpokpogari in the Niger Delta area. Amidst the heat they experience they still dry their harvest without any cares in the world of what might be the impact of the heat emitted from the flares sites because they have no other means and sources of energy supply to dry their harvest.

Women in Ogoni area as well as other Niger Delta host communities experiences various health problems such as strange heat rashes all over their body due to high temperatures, miscarriages, infertility and their young girls between the ages of 19 and 20 years experiencing early menopause, their farm land are now infertile due to lack of nutrient and excessive heat from the gas flares sites.

Gas flares impacts on Communities and food production 

Gas flares in the past 5 decades have so impacted host communities in such a way that these communities whose women preserves and process their food with the heat from gas flares experiences more health problems than those who buy their food items from other processed sources, this is due to the fact that gas flares emits various poisonous and toxic fumes which causes diverse health complications. Gases such as CO2, methane (CH4), among others are the byproducts of gas flares.

Gas flares produces the primary GHGs, CFCs, CO2 and methane (CH4) gases which causes global warming. In addition, flaring of gas rich in liquids can produce smoke, with aerosol effects that also contribute to global warming. Gas flaring causes serious respiratory diseases, cancer of the lungs and also poisons the blood stream with Carbon monoxide, and also leads to serious food security problems by drying up the soil nutrients which in turn results to stunted growths in plants .and poor crop yields due to lack of water and plants nutrients which aids proper plant growth and productivity.

It also renders men infertile as a result of excessive exposure to radiation from the gas flares by worker or community persons who live close to these flare sites. Food processing houses and factories sited close to gas flare sites should be discouraged as it is very poisonous and deadly. It does not only endanger the lives of the poor farmers and workers, it also leaves their product contaminated with toxic chemicals emitted from the flare site.

                                                                                   

We therefore strongly recommend that host community awareness campaigns should be done on a regular basis to enlighten host community people on the dangers associated with food processing around gas flare sites. The Nigerian Government should as a matter of urgency, make stringent laws and take drastic action against defaulting companies not just by payment of fines. Fines for defaulting companies should be so exorbitant so as to deter them. Furthermore the gases wasted as flares can be processed and produced into cooking/domestic gas and also they should stand by their proposed dates to stop gas flares in Nigeria as this will save lives and reduce the current heat waves in host communities in Niger Delta region. The gases flared can be converted and used as a means for power generation in other to increase the nation’s power supply in this era of epileptic power supply.

source:  http://deltanewsroom.com/?p=9535

Spiritual land grabbing

 Spiritual land grabbing By Cadmus Atake- Enade

It so nice and great to have massive land space for spiritual purposes where you commune with your maker (God) in solace and enrich yourself spiritually,  but one thing keep beating my imagination and that is the acquisition of large land for such purposes when local community people needs lands for farming purposes and they are not been given by their community leaders. 


We keep fighting and speaking against multinational corporations and government establishment claiming indigenous land space for their mining, selfish and developmental purposes yet we fail to realize that a new phase  of such land grabbing episode has emerged and it’s from the spiritual perspective. Ask me what this is I can't really say but I just believe is a new form of land grabbing where massive land is acquired by spiritual house and churches at a cheap rate for the purpose of prayer grounds and camp sites but are later turned into business ground rather than what it was initially proposed,  yet the congregation are struggling to survive.


Some have no jobs to sustain themselves and family feeding from hand to mouth yet they contribute for the upkeep of their spiritual leaders and their families because they believe that in there lies their eternal blessings.  


They give their offerings and tithe faithfully and willingly out of a cheerful heart because they know and believe that the Lord blesses a cheerful giver and sometimes they are obliged to contribute specially with various kinds of conditions attached to it.  


They become lean due to lack of food, malnutrition and hunger that prompt them into spiritual exercise of fasting and prayers yet the so called leaders and their families are fat and wallow in affluence with flashy cars and armed security men as body guards.

If I may asked were was it stated that Jesus Christ had armed body guards or security men? Am yet to find out that.

With the current emergency of acquiring massive lands majority of these churches have converted these lands to private owed business ground where they build their private mansions, schools, day care center, universities and guest houses which most times the congregation cannot afford the exuberant fees paid in these schools and guest houses.

As a Christian / believer am not judging anyone but am trying to create a scenario  where these houses of God and men of God will take up the challenges of fighting and eradicating poverty from their congregation by actually turning these massive prayer grounds or part of it into agricultural lands for food crop planting in other to alleviate the sufferings of the masses and their congregation.


In the past the church was a ground for the rescue of souls, rendering support for those in need, criticizing and addressing corruption in the nation and society but these days the church leaders are the major ones that play key roles in the politics of the nation, organizing prayer sessions for corrupt leaders who in their life time may not have visited the four walls of a church building and sometimes they even have dinners and luncheon with them rather than preaching a message of repentance and salvation to them. If asked about this they will tell you that Jesus Christ eat with scribes and the Pharisees so they can do the same.  


They have turn their places of worship into great channels and grounds for political campaigns and solidarity movement when Christ during His days destroyed the tables of the money changers and others in the temple enlightening them that His house is a place of prayer and not for money changing and den of thieves (Matthew 21:13).

The church has now become a place where the congregation is compel to vote for  particular candidates rather than the candidate of their choice, which is not suppose to be.

In the past Men of God were meek and gentle, they are always neutral in their dealings and non partisans, something totally different from what we see today “radical Christians and leaders” all in the name of the violent ones take it by force(Matthew 11:12).

     
These days Men of God now visit presidential lodges and international conferences as though they are personal assistant to the  president,some even have permanent lodge at the government guest house.

They have become so consumed by their lost and quest for material things rather than the things of God which have prompted them to acquire massive community lands for themselves all in the name of spiritual camp ground.

They no longer seek God as was commanded in Matthew 6:33, rather they seek self riches forgetting the fact that seeking God first adds every other thing to your life.

It’s high time men of of God and church leaders sit up to address the issue of poverty in the nation and in the mist of their congregation by careful thinking and sorting out a way to save humanity from extreme poverty which leads to the destruction of their souls as stated in the bible book of proverbs that “the destruction of the poor is their poverty”(proverbs 10:15).

As the bible made it known to us that the lips of the righteous feeds many,(proverbs 10:21a).


It’s high time we  as individuals, Christians and church leaders, find a possible solution to avert the menace of  poverty which is one of the root causes of all evil,corruption and social vices in our society presently.   Ensuring that our environment is conducive for living because it was not so from the beginning, God’s divine purpose for saving us is for us to save our world from all the oppressions of the enemy(Satan and his cohorts) and not to aid them in  destroying  mankind and his environment.

Think about this things and make a change for the better because you are an agent of change to your world don’t fail in this responsibility as posterity will not forgive you if you fail to do that which is right in the sight of God and men.

My Adventurous Trip to Benue State (Makurdi)

Travelling can be fun sometimes but travelling to a new and entirely different region without knowing anyone could be an adventurous experiences.  Such was my case when i took the bull by the horn without considering the dangers of involved in attacking the bulls by horn.

On the 11^th of August 2015, at about my closing hour at work i was called upon as usual by my operational coordinator that there was a an invitation mail from my boss that  I have been assigned to represent my organisation in a stakeholder meeting in Makurdi, Benue state, the North central region of Nigeria and i was so shocked and surprised because it wasn’t a familiar routes to me as this region was new to me. 

I immediately launched into action as i started making enquiries from my colleagues around and calls to friends for direction and guide with prayers in my heart for divine favour and guidance from God to be safe on this adventurous trip. On my way home I called some friend and in the bus, I met a good Samaritan lady who gave me a guide on how to get a direct transport means to Makurdi, but still I was not convinced as is my eyes was glued to mobile phone sorting out flight bookings to Benue state but to my amusement non could be found.

As I enquired my colleague in Abuja informed me that getting to Abuja will be cool but from Abuja to Makurdi will take me another six hours summing up my journey  I will be on the road for another twelve hours making it look like an herculean task ahead of me.

That faithful night I couldn’t sleep as it is usually said when a man wants to embark on a long journey he plans all though the night and journey plans drives sleeps away.

I woke up at about 5am in the morning after my devotion I left the house at about few minutes to 6am with my heart filled with thoughts and expectation on how best I can get to my destination of official assignment with mixed feelings in my heart.

I arrived at my bosses house at about few minutes passed 7am where I was given the necessary resources needed to aid me in embarking on my journey, on my way I was lead to call on a relative who gave me an advice to locate faith motors a transport company which plies directly to Benue State my destination of assignment. I was glad as I received the information with a heart filled with gladness, thinking the journey was within 4-5hours drive.

The Journey

On getting to the car park, I paid the fairs and at about 9:30am we left for Benue, on our way we escaped hitting a lousy driver who stopped almost at the middle of the express road unexpectedly, as God would have it our driver was an experienced guy who followed at a safe distance and was able to sway off from hitting the reckless guy.

We started the journey through the ikpoba hill –Agbor express way, through into the eastern region of the country, we went through Asaba into Onitsha the business hub of the nation. On our way I could vividly notice that the nation is under decay as no region crossed had a 100km stretch of a well tarred express road. All the regions had very bad roads with port holes of 1-2 feet deep, with series of hold ups here and there. It beats my heart to see that Nigerians are going through hell and yet we are smiling , saw little kids that are supposed to be in school hawking their wares along the road undermining the risk of been hit by cars passing by.

These children sell various products ranging from native pears, roosted corn, groundnuts among other things. Various travellers stop by to buy things just to keep memories of the trip. I never got to buy or eat anything as I was careful not to be a victim of driver stop I want to ease myself or use the toilet (bush), as the case maybe because I felt we still had a long journey ahead.

Four hours counting we were still on the highway I became little worried as I started making enquiries in the bus on how many hours we still had to travel but because of the state of the road no one seems to be able to give an estimate of the hours left to travel even the driver could not give me that information. On getting to Enugu State, we made a stopover at Ninth Mile in other to refresh ourselves and ease our selves. After the stopover we continued on our journey, moving from one interior community to the other, seeing new structures, hills and valleys it was an interesting sites to behold but the adjoining roads seems not to be friendly as it posed serious difficulties to access one community to another.

About six and half hours counting we got to the boundary between Enugu and Benue state, after which we drove into Otukpa community in Benue, a community rich in fruits and vegetables, though we didn’t have a stopover but we could testify that from the various food wares displayed by the road side. From that community we had another 3 -4 hours drive according to what was told me by co- passengers, it was a fun trip all the same but I wasn’t still settle as I was still feeling kind of awkward in the bus so I had to ask a, nice lady in the vehicle who gave me the assurance that she will help me get to my destination as soon as we arrived Makurdi, I was glad as my prayers of favour was been answered speedily, I smiled with a sigh of relieve in my heart. She was kind and blessed on getting to another community she bought me corn and I in-turn bought native pear to gnash the corn, the remaining trip was fun as I could now perceive the rich cultural heritage of the Benue people, the sight of their wonderful architectural designs fascinated me as till date they still build their walls with solid bricks, the region posses a large land mass as the people were predominantly peasant farmers, having large land mass for farming with their little thatch hut located at the middle of the farm land.     

    

At about 6:30pm we arrived at Otukpo another community where we had a brief stopover and some passengers highlighted from the bus after which we continued on another two hours drive to Makurdi and at about 7:30pm we arrived at Makurdi on arrival, the nice lady’s husband was already there waiting for her arrival and she quickly introduced me to him and notify him of my destination and I was assured by the man, that he was going to take me there. I joined them in parking her luggages into the car and they helped me in locating my way to the hotel where I was going it was indeed a great journey but funny enough I did not collect their contact as this was so wrong. I realised this immediately they left and dropped me off close to my location and directed me on how to get to my destination. It pained me so much realising that I could not get a chance to tell them thank you for all their assistance so far.

 The people

On getting to the hotel the receptionist was so kind to me and I quickly made enquiries about the meeting I was to attend and luckily for me one of the organisers of that meeting was just waiting by the receptionist desk to welcome guest for the meeting. I approached him and he asked me to relax as another vehicle will be coming to take us to another venue which within few seconds, the driver arrived and took me and others waiting at the lobby to our hotel.

I Arrived at my hotel at about 8pm rushed into the shower took a hot bath, went for dinner and prepared myself for the meeting for the next day.

Waking up in a strange land and after a long distance away from home wasn’t a funny experience at all as I almost could not sleep even with the comfort of the big double sized bed visibly picturing the journey ahead of me when returning back home.

Into the day at the meeting I meet some new faces and people from other CSOs and NGOs who made their contributions to the meeting and I too did made my own input to the issues of discuss.

After the meeting I interacted with some of the people around and got to understand that the people of Benue are so hospitable, kind hearted, caring and understanding, though the economy standard of the people can be rated as poor because despite the abundance of agricultural produce the people lacks preservative industries for their products.  

I was privileged to visit their market to see how it was and I was shocked to see that things were extremely cheap as compared to ours here in the south but one thing they do lack is the presence of industries in state, and this I think the state and federal government should look into with keen interest because agricultural produce and food stuff are been wasted on a daily basis in this area and yet others complain and die of hunger and starvation daily.

Nigeria as a nation is blessed with diversities of resources but until will learn to harness these resources and turn away from our total dependency on crude oil our economy will continue to experience a collapsed structure. In the cause of these interactions I meet Fabian an Idoma guy and a youth Corper from Ogun State who serves in Benue, I made friends with them, they are really interesting guys to be with. 

After the two days meeting it was time to return, back to my base. The thought of the long trip back home got me really anxious as it was a very long one. I checked out of the hotel at about 6am to the car park and at about 7:30am we left Makurdi Benue State, while leaving I could feel the pains in my heart that am leaving a very hospitable and caring people behind but even at that I have to return home as home is home no matter how far and wide you travel.

It was quite a fast journey as the driver this time was more experienced and took some shorter routes which I suspected the first driver is not aware of, after about 6hours of driving we got to Ninth mile and had a brief stopover then we continued our journey on getting to Onitisha at about 4pm we had a brief stopover where a passenger stopped and we continued, while our way on the Onitisha bridge at the Asaba axis in Delta state we came across a tight hold as a result of a fatal accident were all the victims were lying in the pool of their blood lifeless, it was really a sad sight and everyone of us reflected on that sad moments for a while but we had no choice but we just got to change the subject matter as we were still on that same route back home, and at about 6:30pm I got home and thanked God for journey mercies , it was not an easy trip but the experiences was worth sharing hence this memoires – My Adventurous trip to Makurdi.

        

THE RETURN OF THE BUSH MEAT

http://www.voicesofyouth.org/en/posts/the-return-of-the-bush-meat
written by Cadmus Atake-Enade

It’s been some few months after the dreaded Ebola Virus was excommunicated out of Nigeria by a greater divine force, greater than the doctors and scientists we have In Nigeria. The virus caused a high level scare in the minds of the fearless average Nigerian but despite that, God saw us through.

It gave me the courage and boldness to beat my chest once again and identify with my fellow countrymen.

A lot of things began to occur during the period when the scare of Ebola Virus (EV) was high. Institutions that have never thought of personal hygiene developed one, schools, banks, offices etc developed hand washing hygiene as part of their safety measures and people stopped the habit of exchanging pleasantries through handshakes. The one thing that baffled me most was the disappearance of the once popular bush meat spots and palm wine bars along major express ways across the nation.

I wondered, are these really our highways where we used to see countless numbers of bush meat hung on poles along the roads for travelers to stop to purchase food? I was glad to see this development, mostly that these rare species of animals are being kept alive again. However, more recently, while on a transit, I observed the resurgence of bush meats again.

I was kind of surprised that these fearless Nigerians are back in the forests to hunt for bush meat despite the warnings that these bush meats serve as a major host to the dreaded EV, which to me I don’t believe it’s the cause of the virus but at least I was happy it worked for a while to protect, preserve and conserve our wild and rare animals species.

Lost in thought I realized that it takes a dreaded occurrence to convince us that we must protect and conserve our wild which is not suppose to be.

Our environment is our life and so is our responsibility to protect and keep it safe.

A comrade once said ‘‘if you want to destroy a people destroy their environment’’ and that is exactly what we are doing to our wildlife, destroying their existence and driving them into extinction.

Let's not fail in our duties to our environment to keep it safe at all times, we owe nature that because nature has the same rights to live just as we humans do.

Voice Of Nature

culled from http://www.voicesofyouth.org/en/posts/voice-of-nature   

written by Imen Al-Nighaoui

Today I will be the voice of nature.Today I will be the reflection of the sky and the extent of the ground.

Today I will be the green lands and the growing flowers. I will be the falling leafs and the infinite ocean.

I am the blue you see and the air your breathe. Today I will speak for them, I will fight for them and as they don't have a voice besides mine. I will ask you to close your eyes and to imagine yourself standing next to a giant tree that witnessed the rise of men and the fall of nature, a tree that is old enough to tell the story of this earth.

Now look around you, the lands are covered with red and yellow flowers, the smell of this bliss reminds you of silent mornings and exotic evenings. Just few miles away, you can clearly see a hill, a green one, where you can watch a troop of deer and flying birds embracing their home in a great bless.

Now turn around and admire the blue space that is laying before your eyes, see how pure and beautiful it is! You can even hear the rhymed sound of the waves when it embrace the shores.

As we are coming to an end I will ask you for the last time to look at the sky and to behold yourself in the floating clouds. The dream was beautiful but reality is crueler than you can imagine.

Everyday the world is witnessing a new tragedy, the increasing rate of pollution is damaging the earth. As we build more factories we paint the sky black, as we chop more trees we make more species without shelters and as we pour more chemicals into the ocean we intoxicate the whole underwater world.

The human's greed for power is harshly destroying the life of other creatures. As we think only about gaining more money we implicitly bringing about our own downfall.

Global Warming and the Ozone Layer are true issues and they are getting more real as we are witnessing a major climate changes, since more recently we cannot know when it is going to rain or to shine, or whether it is cold or warm. The melting ice lands in the northern zone is going to cover our cities and more dramatically, it will cover our countries, archipelagos and islands as the sea level is increasing sharply.

Millions of species vanished with the awaken of the modern life style and more are going to disappear if we don't stop this unfortunate changes.

The earth is our home, let's start today and let's make the change needed. Let's be our own heroes and let's help ourselves to survive the pollution.

Be the change you want and speak up for nature. If you are looking for solutions go back to yourself and yourself only.

We started this tragedy and only us are able to end it.

Am Black and Proud ....

Am black and proud
am glad to be black
no matter d tribes
they can never steal my pride
...

black is my nature AND culture
black is my structure
black is my texture
black is d future

I can never give up my nature/culture/structure /texture
no matter their pressure
I will always stand by nature
to protect and defend her treasures

am proud to be a black man from Africa,
the cradle of civilization, the seat of greatness,
the land of riches and glory,
the land of the blessed

the desires of the west
the land they wish to perch their tents
because of our wealth,
but we must resist and drive them out of our rest

am proud to be an African  
the best continent on earth
don't judge me by the colour of my skin
because Africa is the seat of the best

we dominates the rest to remain the best...
in all field and structure we will always remain the best
 Am proud to be an African
Am proud to be black...

bY Cadmus Atake-Enade