Author: The Nation

The Ooni of Ife Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi has unveiled a new Queen Mariam Ajibola nine months after his ex-wife, Naomi Silekunola, announced separation from him.

It is the third marriage after Ogunwusi ascended the thrown. The first marriage with Zainab Otiti collapsed before he married an Ondo-based prophetess, Naomi Silekunola, who separated from him on her Instagram page in December 2021.

Confirming the new marriage, Ooni’s Director of Media & Public Affairs, Moses Olafare, explained that the new Queen was welcomed into the palace on Tuesday evening.\

Read Also:Obasanjo, Ooni, Akande for Love of Christ double celebrations

According to him: “The new Queen Ajibola was ushered into the Ile Oodua Palace in Ile-Ife at around 8pm by her mother and other members of her family from Kogi and Kwara states. She was first received by members of Ife Traditional Council led by the Obalufe of Ife, Oba Idowu Adediwura and Lowa Adimula of Ife, High-Chief Adekola Adeyeye who after necessary traditional and spiritual rites performed by the Isoros(Chief priests) presented to the Ogunwusi family and the husband.

“Olori Mariam Ajibola Ogunwusi is a mixed blood as her late father hailed from Ebira ethnic part of Kogi state while her mother hails from Erin-Ile, an ancient Yoruba town in Kwara State.”

Despite the harm it does to the environment and human beings, survival has made many continue to use firewood to cook, writes CHINYERE OKOROAFOR

Mrs Mary Ewerem runs her small-scale restaurant solely on firewood. For the widowed mother of four -notwithstanding the debilitating effects of wood fuel on her health and the climate – it is survival first.

There are only two wooden tables and benches for customers in the tiny buka. On a third table are old pots, plates and cutlery. Construction workers, sand off-loaders, and other menial workers eating inside Mrs Mary Ewerem’s dingy restaurant are unbothered about the smoke wafting into their eyes and nostrils and the ash particles settling on their bodies from her nearby firewood hearth.

It is a small price to pay for a full stomach of Ewerem’s beans, fried potato, yam, plantains or rice and stew.

Every morning, the 45-year-old-woman wakes up at 5 am, to gather pieces of discarded planks at different building sites around the Bucknor area of Ejigbo in Lagos.

The planks help to retain the fire when added to the main firewood she purchases for cooking. Ewerem makes a fire daily whether or not the woods are wet or dry, enduring the smoke.

At moments like this, her mind often drifts to two wishes she would love to accomplish soon: a room for herself and four children, and a university education for her only daughter, the last child.

Even merely expressing her wish in words brings a peculiar glow to her face, like someone who has just been shown a clip of her beautiful future.

“I know that God will do all things according to his riches in glory. My situation will change one day,” Ewerem says softly in the Delta Igbo dialect.

A native of Onicha-Ugbo in Aniocha North Local Government Area of Delta State, Ewerem, perhaps because of the situation she finds herself in, is the hardworking type despite being a housewife before for many years. She didn’t wait for her children to complain of hunger before making something available for them.

As a result, she started the restaurant, to make sure hunger is killed in her family after losing her husband who was a specialised mechanic for Caterpillar vehicles in August 2015.

“Before my husband died, I was not doing any work. I was a housewife. My husband didn’t want me to work. He wanted me to stay at home to be able to take care of our young children and they were still small when he died.”

Ewerem reminisced on her former life living in a two-bedroom flat with her husband before the pangs of death took him away.

“When my husband was alive, we lived in a two-bedroom flat but after he died, I rented a room where I and my children managed. But now, I’m having an accommodation problem because the landlord increased the rent to N7500 and I can’t afford it so we moved out of the place.

“I’m quartering in a friend’s place with my daughter. Once my money is complete, I will go look for a cheaper room to rent. That’s why I don’t have a resting day. I am open from Monday to Sunday to make more money for the rent,” she said.

Despite everything, Ewerem is grateful and proud that her family has a roof over its head. ”If you find yourself in poverty, you don’t have much choice, you manage whatever you have with joy; you keep getting up every day and try to make the best of it,” she reasoned.

Using the edge of her wrapper to wipe her teary eyes and sweating face, Ewerem has been using firewood to cook every day for the past six years. But it was not out of choice. Firewood use was foisted on her by the high cost of gas.

“I don’t have money to buy gas. Gas is expensive. I heard that 12kg of gas is N10.000 now. Where will I see such money to buy gas? Honestly, if gas was affordable, I would prefer to use it because it is the best. I don’t like this firewood that I’m using at all but I don’t have a choice. That is why I’m still using it.

“How will I train my children and pay their school fees? Feeding is high as well. So, if you don’t have the means to do certain things, you make do with what you have. My daughter just finished secondary school, and I was the only one paying school fees every term.

“She is my last born. The first two have also finished secondary school. My first child couldn’t get a job, so, he went to learn how to cut hair. Recently, he is looking for money to open his barbing salon. None of my children can go to university because of money. My daughter wants to go to university but I don’t know yet how much it will cost and the possibility of sending her. But I’m hoping on God,” she said.

Another food seller, Mummy Onyinye, 58, said she can’t afford to use gas because it was expensive.

As she sits on a small stool beside the open firewood stand throwing moulds of grounded beans paste into the hot groundnut oil, she explains why she uses firewood to run her business.

“I have been using firewood for my business for over 12 years every day. As a young girl growing up in the village, we used firewood at home then, later we started using a kerosene stove. I’m used to it though it is not good. I and my husband doesn’t have money. We are managing my sister,” she said.

Read Also:Cooking gas: Consumers resort to firewood over rising cost

The women’s reality

Both women say they will continue to cook with firewood until things get better for them. But they don’t know when that will be.

Sadly, firewood use comes at a great cost to their health.

The smoke is damaging their eyes, Ewerem says she usually uses an eye drop that can make her eyes clear whenever she feels a cloudy covering.

“The smoke is affecting me. Firewood is not good. It makes my body hot and my eyes itch and brings out water. When I look afar, it feels like something is covering my eyes and it was after I started this business that it started.

“Once the covering is much, I will go and buy an eye drop. When I get to a chemist’s shop, I tell them to give me any eye drops that can clear my eyes. I don’t even know the name. But the eye drop gives me relief,” she said, wiping her face with her wrapper,” Ewerem explains.

Mummy Onyinye says the smoke makes her cough and she experiences chest pain as well.

“Although cooking with firewood is tedious, the smoke affects my eyes; it makes me cough and I think the smoke is the cause of my chest pain. I wish I had another alternative way to cook, but other means are expensive. Firewood is cheaper for me. Two bundles of firewood for N1000 will take me a long way,” she said.

Like Ewerem said, The Nation’s checks confirmed that a 12.5kg cylinder of gas is indeed sold for N10,000 depending on the location.

Number of Nigerians using firewood, and charcoal

According to a report titled; “2022 State of the World’s Forests,” released at the ongoing 15th World Forestry Congress (WFC) in Seoul, South Korea and launched by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations, 40 per cent of Nigerians are engaged directly in firewood collection and charcoal production.

The report, however, raised environmental concerns about the further use of wood biomass for bioenergy production associated with greenhouse gas emissions, soil-quality degradation and biodiversity loss.

Last year, at the Nigeria clean cooking forum, the Federal Government said more than 90,000 people, mainly women and children, die annually from smoke and other complications from firewood.

It added that 70 per cent of Nigeria’s population still depend solely on fuel wood in meeting their energy needs for cooking and heating.

Smoke and health hazards

Mary’s story belongs to the vast and invisible tribe of women whose lives are being threatened by the harmful effects of inhaling the smoke that comes from cooking with firewood, charcoal, and kerosene: all inefficient, polluting fuels which are a health risk and major contributor to respiratory diseases, natal complications, heart diseases and premature deaths of children.

According to a World Health Organisation (WHO) report, 4.2 million people die from exposure to outdoor air pollution, in addition to the 3.8 million whose deaths are linked to household smoke produced by dirty stoves and fuels.

These solid fuels produce carbon, one of the biggest contributors to climate change after carbon dioxide. Also, the woods for cooking in form of firewood or charcoal contribute to deforestation which in turn harms climate change.

Speaking on the negative effect of cooking with firewood, a family health doctor in Lagos, Dr Amede Ossai, said the use of firewood and solid fuel is like a double edge sword which harms the user and the environment.

“For users, the smoke when inhaled affects the lungs and can lead to respiratory and heart diseases. Meanwhile, the smoke particles are deposited in the ozone layer which is still emitted into the environment and inhaled by people. The continuous use of firewood and other solid fuel constitutes dirty air and leads to air pollution which defects some of the Sustainable Development Goals, especially SDG3 (Good Health and Well-being, SDG 7 – Affordable and clean energy, SDG 11 -sustainable cities and communities and SDG 13 – climate action),” she said.

Message on 2022 World Health Day

In April, during the commemoration of this year’s World Health Day, it was noted that fossil fuels are responsible for most of the harmful emissions linked to acute and chronic sickness.

Meanwhile, WHO is calling for tangible steps to curb their use.

A report released in the lead-up to World Health Day showed that almost the entire global population (99%) breathes air that exceeds WHO air quality limits, and threatens their health.

The findings have prompted the WHO to highlight the importance of curbing fossil fuel use and the need to take other tangible steps to reduce air pollution levels.

Intervention

In Nigeria, WHO has been supporting the Nigerian government to strengthen health and environmental systems to implement Climate action and Air Quality control measures.

It has facilitated the activation of the National Technical Working Group on Climate Change and Health and 45 public health experts were trained on COP26 health sector climate action.

Any hope in sight?

The women’s plight gives rise to the question: Is there hope for women like them, who are caught in the web of suffocating poverty and struggling to survive?

Last year, the Federal Government announced that it was considering a scheme to transport gas to the nooks and crannies of Nigeria, to make it more available in rural areas. But, unless her financial circumstances improve, or it is deliberately made affordable, the gas might be out of their reach, meaning they would be consigned to their firewood stove.