By Prince J Musa in Kenema
The Environment Protection Agency has expressed grave concerns about the rate of deforestation in Kailahun District. A team of EPA officials visited five chiefdoms in the district where they found out that massive timber logging had been going on.
EPA decided to visit the district following a video on social media that showed logging activities in the chiefdoms.
Addressing the community elders at Yawei Chiefdom, the East and Southern region head of the Agency, Aiah Wurrie Kaimbay, said: “We have proved that there is massive timber logging going on in this chiefdom and it’s a recipe for future disaster in these communities.”
He added: “Management of EPA saw the video of timber logging as a threat to the environment and decided to move at the scene to ascertain firsthand information on the logging in the communities and to talk to the community people about the dangers of allowing logging to continue in their environment.”
Last week, the conservation group, Green Scenery, raised concerns about the government’s lack of support to protect the environment.
In a statement signed by the group’s director, Joseph Rahal, it criticized the government for reversing the ban on timber logging.
Sierra Leone had been ranked as the third most vulnerable country in the world to the effect of climate change. This has been largely blamed on deforestation.
Kembay said they were hoping to find those involved in the act and convince the community to stop them.
“We want to know those behind this timber logging and to also create a platform for the stakeholders so that they can put a ban on this massive logging in the chiefdom and to give then reasons why they should not partake in logging,” Kembay said.
Town Chief of Tentihun Village in Yawei Chiefdom, Momoh Koroma, told the EPA officials that they had no knowledge about the scale of destruction in their forests, noting that they were already feeling the effects of the climate change in their community.
’’We have been experiencing serious problems with our plantation and even we can see rain coming in other places around us, but it doesn’t rain in our villages,” Koroma said
The Eastern region is home to one of the thickest forests in the country, Gola Forest. But human activities like farming and logging is now affecting the wild life and the environment in the area.
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