By Kaddy Jawo
The executive director of the National Environment Agency Momodou Jaama Suwareh has informed the Public Enterprise Committee of the National Assembly of a serious oil spillage incident at Yelli-Tenda in Lower River Region on July 3 2015, which covered the ferry terminal area of 2 kilometers towards Jenoi village.
According to the NEA boss, the culprit was fined D150, 000 for the offense and D200, 000 for the clean-up, amounting to D350, 000 in pursuant to the polluter pays principle enshrined in the National Environment Management Act, 1994.
Mr Suwareh further told the committee that the tanker containing used oil from Senegal was responsible for the spillage.
He also revealed that in September 2016, the NEA received information that an oil spillage occurred on the Serekunda-Brikama highway and the tanker responsible for the spillage was contracted by Gambia National Petroleum Company (GNPC) to transport heavy oil to NAWEC’s global electrical group at Brikama.
The NEA boss said his institution has demanded tanker owners responsible for oil spillage to make payments within 40 days, failure of which the tanker would be sold on public auction and the proceeds would be used to settle the court fine and the cost for clean-up.
Suwareh made these remarks during the presentation of the Agency’s Annual Report and Financial Statement for the year ended 31st December 2015 to 31st December 2016, respectively.
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