NN Special :
When Rome was burning, the Emperor Nero watched the fire from his palace in the Palatine Hill singing and playing the lyre.
According to different historical events, Nero motivated by a desire to destroy Rome secretly sent out his men pretending to be drunk to set fire in the city. As a result, the fire caused widespread devastation in the city before being brought under control.
Despite the grave concern from different quarters over the environmental impact of the disastrous oil tanker accident, Shipping Minister Shajahan Khan on Saturday said the oil spill in the Shela River and its surrounding areas will cause little impact to the Sundarbans.
“It won’t affect dolphins and other animals as the oil has not spread that much. The oil couldn’t enter the forest as fishing nets were used on the mouths of canals to prevent its spread. Besides, the local people are collecting the spilled oil,” he said while talking to reporters after visiting the Chandpai Range of the Sundarabans at Khulna Press Club on Saturday. The shipping minister said that four vessels would be procured from Italy within two years to mitigate such disaster.
A memorandum of understanding (MOU) will be signed in this regard in January next, he added.
This government, he said, first procured 11 dredgers. But the past government simply ignored this matter. The shela River through Sundarban forest where the oil tanker met the accident, declared closed for the time being, he said. Locals said, no effective measures have so far been witnessed from the government side to remove the oil pilled in the rivers and channels in the Sundarbans, the world’s largest mangrove forest, though the tanker ‘Southern Star 7’ capsized in the Shela River five days ago on Tuesday.
Forest officials said the furnace oil from the capsized tanker has already spread over one hundred kilometers through different canals and rivers, causing a serious havoc to the forest, wildlife, fish and other aquatic creatures.
The layers of oil and oil slick are still visible on the water in different parts of the Shela River, including Mrigmari, Joymoni, Beltala, Nandabala and Andharmanik areas, which are feared to hit a vast tract of the Sundarbans, spelling a potential environmental disaster for it. They said various types of dolphins, fish, deer, monkey, bird, plants and other aquatic creatures have already started dying. More loss of wildlife and aquatic creatures are apprehended if the authorities fail to clean up spilled oil from the affected areas immediately. “The biodiversity of Sundarbans now faces a potential threat. The waters of two rivers of the Sundarbans have already contaminated by oil and it led to decline of the required level of oxygen for breathe of rare dolphins,” said environmentalists.
Meanwhile, the authorities on India’s eastern coast are on alert after the oil tanker sank, spilling more than 350,000 litres of furnace oil into the waters of the Sundarbans.
“We are taking all precautionary measures,” Pradeep Vyas, additional director of India’s Sundarban Biosphere Reserve, told newsmen on Friday. The Indian Coast Guard and Border Security Force are both monitoring the situation, and boats are patrolling the rivers that connect the Sundarban region, which straddles the border between India and Bangladesh, he said.
Shajahan Khan said: “We’ve talked to foreign experts who said the oil spilled from the crashed tanker won’t harm the world’s largest mangrove forest that much.” Voicing concern over the oil tanker crash, UNDP Bangladesh Country Director Pauline Tamesis has said this accident once again highlights the need for a complete ban on the movement of all commercial vessels through the Sundarbans.
“Global experience shows that this kind of incident has long term environmental consequences and it requires coordinated multisectoral efforts to restore the affected areas,” she said.
The UN also called for a complete ban on all commercial vessels using the waterways of Sundarbans, the largest mangrove forest in the world. The Shipping Minister said the ban on movement of vessels in the Shela River has brought down traffic at the Mongla Sea Port. “The port faces a crisis of image,” he said.
He also opined that the furnace oil is less harmful then other petroleum substances. The oil will not hamper the ecosystem. Even, no flora and fauna was lost yet, he claimed.
We were compelled to use the shela channel when Ghasiakhali channel was silted. Four dredgers already on operation to reopen the ghasiakhali channel, he said.Meanwhile, two hundred country boats are collecting slick from the Shela River. The Padma Oil Company, so far, purchased about 6,000 litres oil from the villagers at the rate Taka 30 per litre.
