![]() ![]() Maggie Andresen: That’s Samuel Denapo, a fisherman who’s been navigating these waters since boyhood. Samuel Denapo : These dredging activities, this dredger, it created a lot of problems. ![]() But this enduring community has been disrupted by the dredgers sitting in the lagoon, which have displaced enough sand to create 73 acres of land on a neighboring swampy area slated for a tourism redevelopment project. These fishermen live in Ago-Egun Bariga, a small fishing community on the coast of mainland Lagos that’s been here since before Nigeria achieved independence from Great Britain in 1960. In some places the water is so shallow, the fishermen have to turn off the boat’s motor and use a large wooden stick to navigate the lagoon. That ends up being in the middle of the fishermen’s navigation channels. The dredgers are meant to clear built-up sand that blocks jetty traffic, but the churning silt has to land somewhere. A group of fishermen on small-engined boats chat as they submerge branches to attract and trap fish in a traditional technique called Acadja, using light from their cell phones to cut the darkness.Īs the sun breaks over the water, several boats head back to shore - passing two mammoth dredging machines stirring up muck as they collect sand from the lagoon floor. ![]() Maggie Andresen: At 5:30 in the morning, the water is still in the Lagos Lagoon, at the edge of Nigeria’s most populous city. You can also subscribe to The Undark Podcast at Apple Podcasts, TuneIn, or Spotify. ![]() In this episode, join freelance journalist Maggie Andresen and podcast host Lydia Chain as they navigate the profound social, economic, and environmental consequences of dredging for sand in Lagos, Nigeria.īelow is the full transcript of the podcast, lightly edited for clarity. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |