The Lagos State Water Regulatory Commission (LASWARCO) has
sealed the factories belonging to Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company,
FrieslandCampina WAMCO, and Guinness Nigeria for extracting groundwater for
commercial purposes without proper authorisation.
Speaking on Tuesday in Lagos, Olowu Babatunde, director of
technical services at LASWARCO, said the commission had been engaging with the
three companies for over seven years, but they had either partially complied or
failed to comply with regulations, prompting enforcement action.
“We operate a law that empowers us to regulate most of these
heavy abstractors in Lagos State,” Babatunde said.
“Abstractors are individuals or entities that extract large
quantities of groundwater for commercial purposes.
“So, these companies that we have sealed, basically three of
them – Coca-Cola, FrieslandCampina and Guinness, abstract water in large
quantities.
“And we have been engaging them over time. At least, I have
been here for more than seven years now. We’ve been engaging these companies
for more than seven years now.
“Some, either they do partial compliance, or some don’t
comply at all. So, now that we started implementation of our regulation, we now
compel them to fulfil all their regulatory demands.”
On Monday, Tokunbo Wahab, Lagos state commissioner for
environment and water resources, during a press briefing on unregulated
groundwater abstraction, said the environmental management protection law of
2017 empowers LASWARCO to regulate groundwater activities and impose penalties
for unauthorised abstraction.
Wahab explained that unregulated groundwater extraction
could lead to serious environmental consequences, including land subsidence and
groundwater contamination.
According to Wahab, the government in 2020 introduced a 75
percent waiver on groundwater abstraction fees, but unfortunately, many
organisations failed to take advantage of the incentive.
As a result, the commissioner said LASWARCO had been forced
to take enforcement action against those who hadn’t complied.
Wahab noted that LASWARCO had issued letters to
non-compliant organisations, giving them a 72-hour deadline to comply, where if
they fail to do so, they will face penalties for operating without proper
authorisation.
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