Anambra State Commissioner for Environment, Dr. Clem Aguiyi, has warned that Anambra State may vanish from the map in the next 50 years if urgent and radical measures are not taken to tackle the menace of gully erosion ravaging the state.
Aguiyi, who disclosed that 35 per cent of the state’s 4,877 square kilometres landmass has been devastated by erosion, with over 1,200 active gully sites across its 179 communities, spoke on Saturday at Amawbia during the maiden conference of the Anglican Men Fellowship, Diocese of Awka, Amawbia Archdeaconry.
Speaking as Guest Speaker on the theme, “Our Environment, Our Future: The Role of the Church in Environmental Remediation”, the Commissioner, who took his text from Genesis 2:15, said God’s first assignment to man was environmental management – to work and keep the Garden – and not just to build cathedrals.
He lamented that Nigerians have failed in that divine mandate, noting that indiscriminate dumping of waste, blocking of drains with sachet water nylons and channelling of faeces into streams have worsened flooding, disease and land degradation.
According to him, climate change is no longer an ‘oyibo problem’ as seasonal patterns have shifted, heat waves are increasing and houses are collapsing like packs of cards because trees have been felled and compounds fully cemented without space for water percolation.
He therefore gave the Anglican Men a four-point charge to lead the environmental revival.
First, he urged them to see the home as the first environment by planting at least one economic tree before December, stopping waste and bush burning, and constructing proper soakaways to avoid contaminating water sources.
Second, he challenged the Anglican Church, which pioneered education and healthcare, to pioneer green evangelism by establishing nurseries in parishes and giving tree seedlings to children at baptism and to couples at weddings, while making the Men’s Fellowship environmental police of the church.
Third, he urged the pulpit to begin preaching against environmental sins, stressing that dumping refuse in drains and felling trees without replacement are sins against humanity and vandalism of God’s property as stated in Psalm 24:1.
Fourth, he said Anglican men must provide leadership, insisting that if they decide no Anglican family will dump refuse indiscriminately or build without proper environmental safeguards, others will emulate them.
Aguiyi said the administration of Governor Chukwuma Soludo is desilting major water channels, reclaiming gully sites and building compost plants but cannot clean individual kitchens, hence the need for attitudinal change at household level.
Recalling the 2012 flood that submerged St. Peter’s Church, Amawbia, he said it was not the devil but blocked drains that caused it, adding that on the last day, God will ask man not only about souls won but about how he kept the earth entrusted to him.
”If we save our environment, our environment will save our future,” he said.
ANAMBRA MAY VANISH IN 50 YEARS OVER EROSION , DR AGUIYI WARNS ANGLICAN Men From Esomchi Okeke, Awka
Leave a Reply