Women from Uke community in Karu Local Government Area and Abuni community in Awe Local Government Area of Nasarawa State have raised alarm over environmental degradation from mining activities, saying it impacts women more than other members of their communities.
The women raised the alarm at a Capacity Building Engagement on Mining Impacts on Women held in Lafia, the state capital, organized by the Child Health Organisation.
They noted that despite the massive extraction of gold and lately lithium in the affected communities, they lack basic social amenities such as good roads, hospitals and schools for the teeming number of school age children.
“Mining firms are making the lives of the people unbearable through reckless extraction outside approved sites, indiscriminate rock blasting that continues to shake the foundations of the communities, and the environmentally unsound practice of channeling waste water from the mines into farmlands or rivers,” one of the women said.
According to them, in Awe town, the Rafin Jaki river where locals fish has practically been poisoned and rendered unfit for human use due to the channeling of waste water into it.
They revealed that the poisons from the wastewater channeled to the Rafin Jaki River may have been responsible for the deaths of nine children in 2023 after they came down with serious and unexplained illnesses following swimming in the water.
“Even after the incident, every attempt by community members, including the Concerned Awe Youths, to get justice from the mining company involved met a brick wall,” the women revealed.
They maintained that in all of the incidents, women have been most impacted as their livelihood sources have been dislocated.
In the mining sites and surrounding communities, the women alerted that the influx of foreigners who do not speak their language was having negative impacts even on young girls, with increasing cases of sexual harassment reported.
They said there are also cases of young girls confronted with offers to submit their bodies in exchange for casual employment, describing it as transactional sex.
The fallout, according to the women, includes cases of unplanned pregnancies, sexual illnesses and mental health cases among girls in these communities.
The women identified insecurity as a huge burden they now bear, occasioned by the presence of armed youths in the quarries who threaten community members who attempt to stop them from ruining farmlands and buildings considered impediments to their extractive activities.
They demanded that the Nasarawa State House of Assembly carry out a fact-finding visit to mining communities in Uke and Abuni and hear from the locals living around the sites about their lived experiences.
The women also demanded an investigation into the growing cases of sexual harassment and exploitation of young girls in mining communities, and the establishment of mobile courts to prosecute those found culpable.
To ascertain the depth of pollution in the communities, they requested a comprehensive environmental audit of Abuni community, Uke district and environs, including their sources of water and farming environment.
For violators of environmental regulations, the women demanded the revocation of mining licenses and recommended that such firms take full responsibility for clean-up and other remediation efforts, alongside payment of compensation to impacted people.
They also called for the establishment of therapy centres for victims and survivors of sexual and gender-based violence.
In the implementation of the work of the House, the women asked that an adequate number of women be included in the processes to ensure their views are respected and their challenges addressed.
Some of the interventions at the capacity building training came from Philip Jakpor, Executive Director of the Renevlyn Development Initiative; Rahmat Oseze, an SDGs Advocate; and Chenemi Peter of Shelter Life Environmental Initiatives.
Vicky Onyekuru, Executive Director of Child Health Organisation, said in her welcome address that the convening was to give a voice to the women in the affected communities and ensure their demands are amplified to the highest levels of government.
