The Water Hole

Category: Community, Sugar, Tana Delta, Wetlands, Wildlife | Date: Jun 06 2008 | By: thewaterhole

New information has been coming in about the outcome of the NEMA-organized public hearings on the Tana Delta Integrated Sugar Project (TISP). At one point it had become apparent that the EIA for the sugar project had been okayed but a quick follow-up on this information by our wetlands team proved that that was not the case. The truth is that the EIA report has neither been okeyed nor rejected. NEMA has however written to the project proponents so that they can address the pertinent issues that emerged before, during and after the public hearings.

I told you about the happenings during the first public hearing of the project’s EIA at Danisa Village, Tana River and promised to tell you about the other two meetings. Well the proceedings were not so much different in these villages but the sideshows were unique in each meeting.

At Golbanti in Tana River District, the start of the hearings was relatively calm and orderly but it was not long before the ‘circus came to town’. Trouble started when – after the EIA lead expert made his presentation – the local level network of the EAWLS/KWF team asked some very hard questions for which neither the EIA lead expert nor the Mumias/TARDA officials had answers.

These dancers had been hired to sing about the ‘good’ of the project

This is said to have irked the Tana River District Commissioner (DC) who then accused the EAWLS team and particularly our Deputy Director, Hadley Becha, and George Wamukoya of CREEL, of inciting the local leaders. He is reported to have ordered law enforcement officers to ‘contain’ the two. It is at this point that the pro-sugar villagers mobbed around our Land Rover intending to heckle and intimidate our team. The team stood firm. The anti-sugar villagers dared the police to lay a hand on any member of the team (including driver, Benson Vidambu) and ‘the meeting would be over’. The aggressors retreated on hearing this allowing the meeting to proceed albeit with each side of the sugar divide twitching with tension.

When the Kenya Lands Alliance rep took the microphone, he stripped the proposed project bare by his convincing presentation. “It was lethal” said Hadley, “even the pro-sugar group applauded”. This and the Tana River County Council’s argument must have dented the proponents’ hopes of getting the all important go ahead to a painfully significantly scale.

On the next day of the hearing, NEMA went to Witu Trading Center in Lamu District where some 600 hectares of deltaic land are targeted for conversion into sugarcane plantations by the proponents.

On their way to Witu, our team overtook a lorry belonging to TARDA (complete with the characteristic blue parastatal registration plates) full of hecklers they had ‘imported’ from Kipini.

The TARDA lorry ready to pick up its human cargo

This was atrocious and when our team got to Witu they quickly met with the area’s leadership to debrief them on this and other concerns. It was no surprise therefore that the moderator of the hearings decreed – at the start of the hearings – that only Witu residents would be allowed to make presentations.

The human cargo scrambles for standing room in the lorry

Once the meeting was underway pertinent issues were raised. Importantly, the Lamu County Council had not been officially informed of the proponents’ intention to use the 600 ha land. Concerns were raised about the loss of grazing land and livelihoods for the pastoralists and fisher folk of Didawaride, Moa and other villages further afield. There was also mention of impending corruption and dishonesty as had been witnessed by a previous attempt to grow sugarcane in the area by a ‘MAT International’.

The residents pointed out that the EIA presentation only gave the positives of the project and nobody was telling them about the negative impacts of the project. At some point – while taking the heat from Hadley – the EIA lead expert could be seen to be telling lies and half-truths.

Now the public hearings are done and it emerged clearly that the EIA study was deficient and it failed to address very important issues. Although the push among the political class is for the project to get the go ahead for the sake of ‘development’ in the area, NEMA could not totally ignore the concerns raised.

In this regard, NEMA has written to the project proponents asking them to address the issues raised among them biodiversity, water balance and land ownership. It is until these questions have been answered that NEMA will make their final decision. It is to be noted however, that the EIA report has not yet been rejected.

Conservationists are now regrouping to forge a way forward given what we know up to this point in time. You can be assured that although some battles have been won, the war is still on.

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