Dredging increases sea currents and makes it difficult for fisher folks with smaller boats to navigate.
By Ishaya Ibrahim, News Editor
70-year-old Elizabeth Iwalokun braces the sea current of Lagos daily in search of fish. With her small boat, she could dive deep into the water bodies like Santiago in Ernest Hemingway’s Old Man and the Sea to inspect her fishing traps. On some days she would make big catches. Other days, little, or sometimes nothing. But she was always hopeful of a better tomorrow.
But that ‘tomorrow’ for Iwalokun is being threatened by Lagos State’s dredging and sand filling projects on all the shorelines of Makoko. Dredging increases sea currents and makes it difficult for fisher folks with smaller boats to navigate.
Even her abode in Makoko is also not spared. The fear of the Lagos government’s demolition squad invading the place often keeps her awake at the night. Recall that in March 2018, policemen came forcefully into Makoko in what the community says is a land grab. It resulted in the policemen shooting two persons who perhaps stood in their way. Kola, the son of Iwalokun, is one of the deceased.
Eminent environmentalist, Dr Nnimmo Bassey, held a consultation meeting with these fisher folks in Makoko, on September 21. The parley was organised by Fishnet Alliance, an association of fishers within the African shoreline, and Global GreenGrant Funds.
Fisher folks turned out in their numbers for the meeting. It was an avenue to amplify their voices for help.
In a remark, Dr Bassey said whatever developmental project is done must be in agreement with the people, otherwise, it is unacceptable.
According to him, “everybody has the right to safe and satisfactory foods and fishers are the ones providing safe fish.
“They have a human right to life, they have a right to involve in lawful economic activities. They have a right not to be rendered homeless,” he said.
Bassey said Makoko’s people, through their fishing occupation, were contributing immensely to the economy of Lagos State and needed to be applauded, not demolished.
“Makoko is one of the riverine communities in Lagos. It is a place where you have people from various parts of the country, people who are fishers and they come from other places, they reside here. So, it is a place where you see life in most likely manner, people are very hardworking and families are so united. It is a place that we need to learn from.
RELATED
With floating market, fishing, and football, Makoko loves to remain itself
“But they face serious challenges. One is the threat of displacement. It is always hovering over this community. This is a place to live and sleep with one eye, and sadly the activities around the area, the sand-filling, and dredging, all these are affecting fishing.
“This is a very vital community that is really helping the economy of the state. The community has been working on how to get the government to pay attention to their plight, to support them rather than threaten them.
“I have seen cases of many informal communities demolished across the city, but this can only be called informal because they don’t have enough support. It is an underserved community and we are calling on the government to come here and see how to improve the situation, not to demolish or threaten the people. The work they are doing here is something that they should be applauded for because the fish they produce is one of the best forms of protein for the average Nigerian.”
Dr Bassey pointed out that if fishers on the country’s 850kms of coastline are supported, they would contribute immensely to reviving the economy, just like their counterparts in Ghana who rake in about 1 billion dollars every year.
In his words, “We have seen that fishers in Nigeria don’t have the due support they ought to have. If you go to other West African countries, fishers are well organised. They have fish pots, they have facilities for refrigeration and for processing.
“If they are supported, rather than being threatened, they will help in tackling sea level rise and climate change. These are communities that are helping to revive the economy of this nation,” he added.
He went on to advise them to properly organise themselves as a group, have leadership and always speaks with one voice in order to get urgent attention from donors and other support organisations.
The fishers who had happily welcomed the guests with their traditional songs and chanting expressed dismay that all efforts to make the state government come to terms with their plight yielded no results as the dredging and sand-filling activities were ongoing, threatening their existence on all fronts.
According to them, with the sand-filling of the shorelines, they are now compelled to go to the high seas for their fishing activities, and they do not have the facilities to go that far.
The fishers, who called on donors to assist them with funding to acquire bigger boats and other equipment suitable for open ocean fishing, decried that their small and rickety boats often capsize because they cannot withstand the strong ocean current.
Among the fishers were women, aged from 60 years upward including Mrs Victoria Oyoola and Mr Dosugan Isaac who said he was born in Makoko over 70 years ago, and spent his entire life there.
Isaac noted that he inherited the fishing occupation from his father, insisting that at his age, he could not switch to any other occupation outside fishing.
Lamenting threats to their existence, he stated that though the government had assured them verbally that they won’t eject them, but their actions proved otherwise.
The high point of the event was the donation of fishing nets, baskets, and ropes, among others to the fishermen and women by Fishnet Alliance, coordinated by Dr Nnimmo Bassey.
