Nema warns Moyale traders over handling of fuel

Marsabit NEMA Coordinator Vincent Oloo (left) and a law enforcement officer (right) talk to a miraa trader who was arrested in Marsabit town for allegedly being in possession of plastic carriers on June 23, 2022.

The National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) has put on the spot government institutions, devolved units and traders who degrade the environment in Marsabit.

Marsabit NEMA coordinator Vincent Oloo issued a stern warning to traders in Moyale who vend petrol and diesel by the roadsides in the town.

“We warn all the open-air petrol vendors in Moyale town to stop before we take legal action against them,” Mr Oloo told the Nation on phone.

He explained that petrol was a listed explosive that could have many adverse uses if ‘carelessly’ sold.

He told the traders that according to the Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (EPRA) requirements, the sale of petrol should only be left to filling stations.

NEMA was also worried that despite single-use plastic being banned in Kenya, Marsabit residents were still blatantly contravening the ban.

Mr Oloo noted that a lot of plastic commodities were still being allowed in Kenya from neighbouring Ethiopia.

He further put on the spot all the petrol stations to strictly comply with the environmental license regime.

He revealed that plans were underway crackdown on all the national government and the devolved unit’s projects that were non-compliant with the environmental license regime.

The authority intended to weed out all the government agencies and individual businesses that were non-compliant with the environmental laws.

All the businesses were required to have environment impact assessment reports.

He called on butcheries, car washes, and petrol stations to have effluent discharge systems to avoid being closed.

All the traders were also required to prepare environmental audit reports on time to prove that their projects were of sound environmental management practice.

The authority’s stern warnings come only a few days after it undertook a crackdown in Marsabit town that led to the arrest of over 25 people who were set to appear in court on June 28, 2022, having been released on bond.

The crackdown saw 11 shops and butchery attendants, five health facility owners, four garage owners, three car washes, and two petrol stations operators arrested for non-compliance with the environmental license regime or using plastic bags.

The next crackdown would target hotels, markets, quarries, stone crushers, supermarkets and residential flats in Marsabit and Moyale towns.

Plastic waste poses a big threat to the environment as it remains in the environment for long and does not decay, eventually turning into microplastics, which first enter our food sources and then the human body.  
 
According to data by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, 300 million tons of plastic are produced in the world every year, of which 14 million tons wind up in the sea.