Far From Gulf, a Spill Scourge 5 Decades Old

This particular, ongoing for a half-century, environmental catastrophe has always been in the forefront of my mind in terms of what we are doing to the planet.  As with the people who live there, I ask, why has it taken so long for the rest of the world to notice?  Why is it that only now, when white people of the so-called developed world are catastrophically, criminally affected by the environmental murder these Big Oil criminals do everywhere, every day, and have done for over a century, that primary media deigns to mention this half-century crime?

Considering the stranglehold these same corps have on our local and federal government via the wealth they poor into the pockets of those who are elected to supposedly guard ours, the taxpayers' interest, how can anyone then wonder how massively corrupt rulers in these nations are successively in power in these nations?  Now it's caught up with us -- you might even say that history has bitch-slapped us over and over again, since 9/11.  When are we going to pay attention, instead of complaining about how depressing it is when people like me bring it up?

It's no longer happening way over there, somewhere, that has no effect on us. It's here. Right here, and has been for decades now. It's caught up with us -- you might say that history has bitch-slapped us over and over again, since 9/11. When are we going to pay attention, instead of complaining about how depressing it is when people like me bring it up?


From the NY Times:

The Niger Delta, where the wealth underground is out of all proportion with the poverty on the surface, has endured the equivalent of the Exxon Valdez spill every year for 50 years by some estimates. The oil pours out nearly every week, and some swamps are long since lifeless.

Perhaps no place on earth has been as battered by oil, experts say, leaving residents here astonished at the nonstop attention paid to the gusher half a world away in the Gulf of Mexico. It was only a few weeks ago, they say, that a burst pipe belonging to Royal Dutch Shell in the mangroves was finally shut after flowing for two months: now nothing living moves in a black-and-brown world once teeming with shrimp and crab.


Not far away, there is still black crude on Gio Creek from an April spill, and just across the state line in Akwa Ibom the fishermen curse their oil-blackened nets, doubly useless in a barren sea buffeted by a spill from an offshore Exxon Mobil pipe in May that lasted for weeks.

The oil spews from rusted and aging pipes, unchecked by what analysts say is ineffectual or collusive regulation, and abetted by deficient maintenance and sabotage. In the face of this black tide is an infrequent protest — soldiers guarding an Exxon Mobil site beat women who were demonstrating last month, according to witnesses — but mostly resentful resignation.