Dozens of women from Kula, a riverine community in Akuku-Toru Local Council of Rivers State, have embarked on a peaceful protest to highlight their hardship over the prolonged absence of electricity and water supply in the area for more than two years.
The women, who marched to the Jetty and security checkpoints within the community while displaying placards with different inscriptions, complained that the persistent power outage has worsened water scarcity across the community.
They decried that despite accommodating strategic national assets and three major oil firms, the community continues to grapple with lack of essential services, abandonment, and deprivation, noting that the situation has caused severe hardship and made living conditions unbearable.
According to the protesters, the absence of basic amenities has negatively impacted public health, residents’ welfare, and the local economy, particularly small-scale businesses operating in the area.
They also stated that the situation has further driven up the cost of living in the riverine settlement, compelling many families to depend on polluted water from reptile-infested wells for daily use, with serious health consequences.
One of the protesters, identified as Ibitonye, said: “We are protesting because of the absence of light and water. We are angry. The women of Kula are suffering. Please, we want the Federal Government to intervene.
“If you see the well we draw water from, you will shed tears for us. And this is injustice for us the people who have oil wells surrounding them. At least in Rivers State, we have the highest number of oil wells.
“Malaria wants to completely exterminate us because of the kind of water we drink and the environment we live in. Cholera is everywhere.”
They therefore issued a save-our-soul appeal to the Rivers State Governor, Siminalayi Fubara, officials of Akuku-Toru Local Council, the Federal Government, and oil companies operating in the area to intervene by restoring electricity supply on the Island to ease their suffering.
“We are, therefore, calling on the governor, the local council chairman, Renaissance and Bella oil, to help us with light because we are suffering, no light, no water,” she said.
