Towers of Controversy

The National Environmental Standards Regulation and Enforcement Agency (NESREA) shuts down base stations of Globacom and Etisalat for violating the nation’s environmental laws, as the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) meets with NESREA to iron out issues of regulatory boundaries
By Oji Odu
Air pollution, noise pollution, gas flaring, oil spillage, global warming are often engendered in the quest for growth and development by nations of the world, albeit with the people suffering the horrible impacts, health-wise.
The decision, however, to check the environmental impact of operators in various sectors on the health of the citizenry often pitch such outfits against the National Environmental Standards Regulation and Enforcement Agency (NESREA).
Penultimate week for instance, NESREA shut down the base station of the country Second National Carrier (SNC), Globacom, located at OAU Quarters, Maitama, Abuja for violating environmental laws. The enforcement excise was led by the Deputy Director, Inspection and Enforcement of the Agency, Mrs. Miranda Amachree.
Explaining reasons for the decision, Amachree disclosed that the base station was rather too close to residential buildings and posed grave dangers to both the buildings and residents of the area.
Amachree: “The emission from the base station is dangerous. Also, the sound of the generating set– which works for 24 hours non-stop – is a source of noise pollution to the residents.
“The vibration of the equipment can make building structures collapse. As you can see, the enclosing fence of the base station is already cracking, the same thing can happen to the buildings in the area. The residents had before now brought petition to the agency on the hazards the base station posed to them,” Amachree explained.
She revealed that the agency had earlier shut down a base station belonging to Etisalat in Abuja because the telecommunications company did not obtain an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) certificate before erecting the mast. The same fate, Amachree warned, would befall any base station that has been served notice by NESREA but is yet to comply.
Warning that the exercise would be a continuous one until full compliance by the operators is achieved, the NESREA Inspection and Enforcement official stressed that there would be no sacred cows, even as the agency has already taken some telecommunications operators who erected masts without carring out Environmental Impact Assessment to court.
Since the deregulation of the telecommunications sector in 2001, the hoisting of telecommuncation masts in residential areas has continued to generate intense controversy, due essentially to the health implications to residents.
Ironically, while some Nigerians, including those in the remote parts, see the setting up of telecommunications masts on their properties or in their villages as harbinger of good and stress-free economic fortune, others the world over view its presence as a Greek gift and so promptly kick against it.
Besides residents of OAU Quarters, Maitama, Abuja, the Lagos State Government has engaged the telecommunications companies over indiscriminate setting up of masts within the metropolis. Although some allege that such opposition is motivated by economic gains, the government insists that its concern is the environmental and health hazards caused by indiscriminate and often unapproved hoisting of telecommunications masts within residential areas.
Speaking to The Source on the face-off between the state government and telecommunications operators, Joe Igbokwe, chairman, Lagos State Infrastructure Maintenance and Regulatory Agency (LASIMRA), said that the agency was set up to regulate the activities of telecommunications operators who in the name of Information Communication Technology (ICT) have continued not only to endanger the Lagos environment but the lives of its inhabitants. This, Igbokwe said they have done by indiscriminate erection of masts, thereby violating the Lagos skyline and damaging other infrastructure.
Igbokwe: “LASIMRA was set up by the Lagos State Government to check the indiscriminate setting up of telecom masts in the Lagos metropolis, which have not only violated the Lagos skyline but damaged other infrastructure.
“The emission from these base stations pose health risk to over 20 million Lagosians, which is why the state has resolved through this agency to check the unhealthy activities of these telecommunications providers. They have been to the courts to stop us, but we are ready to do everything to protect both the environment and people of Lagos State,” he said.
The Source learnt that the enforcement of the Lagos State Edict No. 13, of July 2, 2004, which “empowers the setting up of LASIMRA to do among other things, establish procedure for constructing lines and laying of cables across public lands and property, monitor the erection of towers, masts, or laying of cables within the state in the interest of the people, et cetera;” and sanction any telecommunications operator who embarks on such ventures without permission, led to litigation by the operators.
An earlier judgement delivered by a Federal High Court in Lagos had favoured the telecommunications operators, as the court granted an order of perpetual injunction restraining Lagos state, its Attorney-General and the Inspector-General of Police from implementing the LASIMRA law.
Not satisfied with the judgement, the Lagos State Govenrment on Wednesday, January 7, 2009, took the matter to the Supreme Court in a bid to stop the telecommunications operators from further installing masts in the state without authorisation.
The Source’s findings reveal that on January 6, 2009, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the sector’s lead regulatory body, had asked telecommunications operators to stop the indiscriminate hoisting of masts within residential areas. The Commission had enjoined them to collate their masts at particular places and device means of sharing masts among themselves, warning that it’s heavy hammer will soon start descending on operators who do not consider the welfare of the people in their business.
Apart from Nigeria there are concerted efforts in other parts of the globe aimed at stopping telecommunications operators from jeopardising the health of the people with their masts. For instance, in Nelson, New Zealand, a group of concerned parents recently came together under the auspices of Ban the Tower (BT), to highlight the negative health implications associated with the erection of towers in the residential neighbourhood of Atawhai on the North side of the city.
The group had asked for a total change of telecommunications site analysis policy and non-erection of masts within 100 metres of any school or play centre.
However, it has been mixed reactions about the health implications of cell towers among radiologists and other scientists.
An extensively researched document by Goldsworth Residents Against Masts (GRAM) in the United States of America (USA) on wireless technology based on copious independent international research contends that telecommunications masts have serious health effect on those exposed to them, especially those 20 to 40 times above the precautionary maximum (P>Max).
It listed the major health effects of masts to include DNA damage leading to breast and testicular cancers, causing or worsening of epilepsy, reduction of melatonium level in reduced cancer fighting cells in the body. Others include sleeping disorders, greater risk of arteriosclerosis and coronary heart disease, increased blood pressure, engendering great risk to blood clot and stroke.
Yet by some accounts, such claims are easily debunked by some groups which deny links to exposure to telecommunication mast radiation. A scientist, James A. Frapwell, in fact claims that “there is no link between mobile communication and any adverse health effect,” adding that, “the microwave radiation from telecom mast contains nothing that could cause health hazard.”
Meanwhile, the shutting down of both Globacom and Etisalat base stations by NESREA has raised fresh concern over the issue of regulatory boundary between the agency and the NCC.
Explaining, the new Executive Vice Chairman of the NCC, Dr. Bashir Gwandu said recently that the Commission has begun talks with NESREA over regulatory boundaries with regards to environmental impacts of some telecommunications infrastructure. Similar talks, he said, would be also held with the Minister of Environment.
Gwandu: “We have set up a meeting with the Minister of Environment and NESREA to discuss issues of regulatory boundaries between the government agencies and the NCC.”
Telecommunications operators had stoutly protested NESREA’s actions, describing it as double regulation for an industry which already has the NCC as regulator.
Several attempts to reach Head, Public Affairs of the NCC, Reuben Muoka were unsuccessful as he was said to either be unavailable or in a meeting. But LASIMRA boss, Igbokwe told The Source that very soon, the face-off between the agency and LASIMRA would be over and all the illegalities associated with indiscriminate hoisting of telecommunications masts in Lagos State would stop.
Igbokwe: “The shutting down of the base stations of Globacom and Etisalat goes to prove that LASIMRA is afterall right in its fight against unauthorised hoisting of masts in the state. The activities of these telecommunications companies are illegal, and though they won the first suit at the Federal High Court, we appealed against the jdugement and soon, you will see that the tables will be turned against their illegality which does not consider the health implications of the exposure of Lagosians to radiation from masts. Even the NCC’s several advice to them to collate and share masts has been in vain.”
Industry sources, however, opine that checking the octopal excesses of telecommunications operators, is a positive development.