A former Governor of Imo, Chief Ikedi Ohakim, says over 100 million or 50 percent of Nigerian citizens are directly or indirectly threatened by desertification, deforestation and erosion.


Ohakim made this known in a paper he delivered at the 2019 Public Service Lecture and Award Series of the University of Ibadan Alumni Association, Imo State Branch.

The lecture which held in Owerri had the theme: “Nigeria: The Leadership Question”.

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Ohakim said that the annual rate of deforestation in Nigeria stood approximately at four per cent or about 400,000 hectares to 450,000 hectares.

According to him, out of 909.890km2 of the country’s land area, about 600,000km2 or 65.94 per cent of the total land area had been lost to desert encroachment.

“Over 100 million people or 50 percent of our citizens are directly or indirectly being threatened by desertification, deforestation and gully erosion,” he said.

Ohakim called on Nigerians to cooperate with governments in curbing deforestation by stopping what he called “people’s bizarre behaviour such as refuse madness, indiscriminate cutting of trees, open defecation, over grazing and others in the midst of climate emergency”.

“It is an inescapable fact that we have gotten to the point of profound disconnect from our environment and one another.

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