Residents Raise Alarm Over Filling Station Construction In Elekahia

Residents living along the Boms axis of Elekahia, Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, have raised the alarm over the ongoing construction of a petrol filling station within the residential areas.
They expressed fear that locating a filling station within residential area was risky and called on the appropriate authorities to come to their rescue by stopping the construction.
A landlord, who shares a boundary with the said filling station, Mr Okechukwu Aka-Boms, claimed that the filling station was being constructed on a parcel of land belonging to one late Chief Iche Akarolo.
Aka-Boms stated that several attempts made to hold a dialogue on the matter were rebuffed by both the land owners and the filling station owner.
According to him, “when I confronted them, they said they had insurance that covers the filling station location; on further probing, I was told that they had finalised with NNPC and they had given them certificate to work there”.
He said, “I am worried because I have heard about gas and filling station explosions and they are fatal. My tenants now live in fear as anything can happen. It is not proper to live in close proximity to a petrol filling station. I decided to adopt dialogue but the contractors, filling station owners and land owners have refused to make themselves available”.
In their reactions, two tenants living beside the new filling station under construction, Mrs Abidede Tariebi and Mr Usen Sampson, expressed fear that their lives and property were at risk and wondered why the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), would allow such a construction in a densely populated area.
On her part, the wife of one of the land owners, Mrs Vivian Akarolo, stated that their tenants were offered back their rent to enable them, relocate but some of them refused.
She claimed out that they had the full blessing of DPR as series of inspections were carried out by the control agency.
“DPR came on inspections, they did series of inspections, we did not just start building a filling station”, she said.
The supervising manager at the site, Mr Henry Adodo, in a chat with The Tide said that, “In Nigeria of today, it will be very difficult to erect a filling station without proper documentation. The way constructions go in Port Harcourt, DPR must be aware, Urban Development would be aware, local government would be aware, all relevant bodies must be aware”.
Meanwhile, the Principal Consultant, Institute of the Environment, Onwusameka Ogbowuokara, suggested that the distance between oil facilities and residential homes should be increased to 200 yards at least.

By: Tonye Nria-Dappa