By JKNewsMedia
HOLDING CORPORATE polluters accountable and protecting vulnerable communities formed the core of a call by Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa (CAPPA) as the world marked World Environment Day (WED) 2026 under the theme, “Inspired by Nature. For Climate. For Our Future”.
JKNewsMedia.com reports that the organisation called on the Federal and state governments to hold corporate polluters accountable, protect vulnerable communities, and confront the growing impacts of climate change across the country.
In a statement signed by its Media and Communications Officer, Robert Egbe, to commemorate the global observance, CAPPA reaffirmed its commitment to climate justice, environmental accountability, and inclusive climate governance across Africa.
The group said Nigeria’s environmental crisis is “a lived reality for millions of citizens whose health, livelihoods, and futures are endangered by pollution, ecological degradation, climate related disasters, and regulatory failures.”
CAPPA expressed concern over reports indicating that British multinational Shell continued to transport crude oil through pipelines in the Niger Delta despite longstanding evidence, including from its own staff, that this was causing widespread pollution and environmental damage.
“Communities across the Niger Delta have spent decades bearing the burden of these oil spills, contaminated water sources, damaged farmlands, destroyed fisheries, and lost livelihoods,” CAPPA Executive Director, Akinbode Oluwafemi, said.
“Environmental accountability cannot remain optional. Corporations that profit from the extraction of natural resources must also be held responsible for the environmental and social costs of their operations.”
Oluwafemi called on relevant regulatory agencies to ensure full remediation of polluted sites, transparent environmental monitoring, and meaningful compensation for affected communities.
CAPPA also said that more than a decade after the United Nations Environment Programme’s landmark assessment of oil pollution in Ogoniland, many of its key recommendations remain only partially implemented.
The organisation said the slow pace of environmental remediation and restoration across affected communities sends a troubling signal that environmental harm can persist without adequate consequences.
“The lesson from Ogoniland is that pollution does not end when the headlines fade,” Oluwafemi said.
“Communities continue to live with contaminated soil, polluted water, damaged livelihoods, and health risks for generations. Nigeria must strengthen the enforcement of environmental laws and uphold the principle that polluters, not citizens, taxpayers, or affected communities, must bear the full cost of environmental damage and restoration.”
The organisation also highlighted conditions in the coastal communities of Ayetoro and Abereke in Ondo State, where residents continue to face severe coastal erosion, flooding, sea incursion, and displacement.
CAPPA said Ayetoro has for decades stood as one of Nigeria’s most visible examples of environmental neglect, with the community steadily losing homes, schools, places of worship, and public infrastructure to advancing ocean waters.
The organisation said the continued vulnerability of communities in the Ilaje area reflects the failure of successive governments to implement long promised shoreline protection and climate adaptation measures.
“It is unacceptable that communities facing existential threats from rising sea levels and coastal erosion continue to wait for meaningful government intervention while their homes literally disappear into the Atlantic Ocean,” said Olamide Martins Ogunlade, Associate Director and Head of Climate Change and Extractives at CAPPA.
He urged the Federal Government, the Ondo State Government, and relevant agencies to urgently implement sustainable coastal protection projects and climate adaptation programmes capable of safeguarding lives and livelihoods.
CAPPA also said climate change is increasingly aggravating resource based conflicts across Nigeria, including recurring clashes between herders and farming communities in several northern states.
“Climate change is no longer only an environmental issue. It is a food security issue, a public health issue, a livelihood issue, and increasingly, a peace and security issue,” the organisation said.
The group called for greater investment in climate resilient agriculture, sustainable land management, water conservation initiatives, and conflict sensitive adaptation programmes.
CAPPA also warned that climate governance processes are becoming vulnerable to policy capture by powerful commercial and political interests that prioritise market expansion, extractive economic models, and financialised climate mechanisms over ecological sustainability and social justice.
“The growing dependence on carbon markets and offset based frameworks raises significant concerns regarding environmental integrity, transparency, land dispossession, weak regulatory oversight, and the commodification of forests, biodiversity, and community livelihoods,” Ogunlade said.
“Such mechanisms risk enabling major emitters to delay meaningful decarbonization while transferring environmental and social burdens to vulnerable populations in the Global South.”
JKNewsMedia.com also reports that the organisation called on governments and other stakeholders to advance transparent, accountable, and people centred environmental governance systems.
“As we mark World Environment Day 2026, we call on policymakers at all levels to strengthen environmental governance, enforce existing laws, invest in climate adaptation and resilience, and ensure that corporations responsible for environmental harm are held fully accountable.
“Environmental justice requires more than sympathy for affected communities. It requires accountability. Communities should not be left to pay with their health, livelihoods, culture, and future while polluters walk away from the damage they have caused.
Nigeria must ensure that those responsible for environmental destruction are held liable for remediation, compensation, and restoration.”
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