The Lagos State government has raised the alarm that more oil explosions are imminent in the metropolis, if nothing urgent is done to rectify all the ruptured oil pipelines in about 13 communities in the state.
The Commissioner for Physical Planning and Urban Development, Mr. Fransisco Abosede, confirmed the oil leakages. He said people were already scooping oil in about 13 communities across the state. He disclosed this while briefing journalists on the oil pipeline fire at Abule-Egba in which hundreds of lives were lost.
Some of these communities, according to him, include Agbado Oke-Odo, Baruwa community, Ipaja, Uwa Community, Akute-Oke, Ilashe village, Omoru village, Imore, Ijegun, Ifako-Ilamoro, Adosoba, Takwa Bay, Oko-Ititre among others.
He called on the Nigeria National Petroluem Corporation (NNPC) to ensure that the leaking pipelines were rehabilitated. He condemned the action of criminals that engaged in pipelines vandalisation, saying it was a grave act of sabotage against the state, which should be addressed accordingly, and appropriate punishment administered to culprits.
He appealed to the people of Lagos who engaged in this notorious act, to desist from it, pointing out that the loss of innocent lives recorded on Tuesday should serve as a warning to perpetrators.
Abosede blamed the NNPC and other Federal Government agencies� laxities, negligience and inadequacy in monitoring pipeplines for the tragedy.
According to him, the explosion could have been averted if the NNPC, Petroleum Products Marketing Company (PPMC) and the Department of Petroluem Resouces (DPR) had heeded the warnings and alarms raised by the state government over the poor state of pipelines within the state.
The commissioner drew the attention of journalists to letters written by the state government in the past to the Federal Government, NNPC, and other relevant agencies about the deplorable condition of NNPC pipelines in the state.
In one of the memos addressed to President Olusegun Obasanjo by Governor Bola Tinubu, copies of which were forwarded to the Group Managing Director of NNPC, and the Ministry of Environment about the state of pipelines, the state government suggested ways to protect the pipelines.
Paragraph four of the letter read: �Your Excellency, apart from bringing this development to your knowledge, a fundamental reason for my letter is to request you to kindly focus attention on how to eliminate these pipelines ruptures as well as inadequate security lapses noticeable in all the pipelines spread all over the state in order to further prevent any calamity which may be worse than past occurences.�
Contrary to speculations that the state government was in the habit of indiscriminate granting of approval for building development along the rights of way of pipelines in parts of the state, Abosede said the state government did not grant permits for buildings on the rights of way of pipelines.
According to him, pipelines� rights of way were within the purveiw of the Petroleum Act of Nigeria and it behoved on the Federal Government, through its agencies, to continually monitor these areas in order to avert calamities.