Parliament report reveals: Government officials involved in marketing banned pesticides [Archives:2008/1135/Local News]
By: Almigdad Dahesh Mojalli
SANA'A, March 4 ) The Committee of Agriculture and Irrigation in the Yemeni Parliament disclosed last week the implication that officials in the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation and Hodeidah governorate allowed banned pesticides to enter the country illegally through Hodeidah port.
The cargo consists of five 20 20-foot containers which contain 58,500 kiloliters of pesticides, going to Daghsan corporation warehouses in Sana'a city.
In its report, the committee said that the cargo of chemicals and poisons constitute a very dangerous risk to people's lives, and can cause damage to the environment, plants and soil.
The committee asked for everyone who participated in letting the cargo enter Yemen to be handed over to the court for prosecution to be punished according to the Constitution and law. The report affirmed applying the punishments stipulated in law 25 for the year 1999 regarding the circulation of pesticides, on the importer Saleh Ahmed Daghsan.
The people involved in releasing the cargo of pesticides are Mohammed Ahmed Daghsan, the representative of Bin Daghsan corporation, Abdullah Shamlan, the head of the Oversight and Inspection Department in the General Department for Plants Protection. Ali Muhriz, the head of the registration department in the General Department for Plants Protection, Yassen Al-Naqeeb, the head of the Department of Oversight in the General Authority for Plants protection, and finally Omer Abdullah Al-Muqbli, a security officer for the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation.
According to a report issued by Parliament in June 2007, the pesticides were released from Hodeidah port's customs department and moved to Daghsan Corporation warehouses. “However, the pesticides were supposed to be stored at Ministry of Agriculture warehouses, but they were fully packed with other goods,” the report added.
Parliament member (MP) Moqtar Sadeq Abu Rass, who is also on the Agriculture Committee, stated that the container locks were broken by Daghsan corporation. “Daghasn broke the locks and sold the pesticides, so when the Ministry of Agriculture went to claim the cargo, they found that half of it had been sold and distributed in Taiz and Al-Dhale'e governorates,” said Abu Rass.
The committee expressed its regret that the public prosecution hasn't notified the committee about the steps it has taken concerning the matter, despite transferring the issue to the public prosecutor on February 14, 2007. “The prosecution refuses to inform us about what they have done about the issue so far. It never informs us about anything under the pretext that the judiciary is independent,” added Abu Rass.
On his part, Minister of Agriculture and Irrigation Mansour Al-Hawshabi confessed before Parliament the ministry's inability to tackle pesticides smugglers, and requested the cooperation of all official authorities and people in restricting this dangerous epidemic.
During the February 26 Parliament session, Al-Hawshabi said that pesticides smuggling is ongoing and complained to the MPs that the prosecution hasn't adjudicated in the smuggling cases that have been transferred to it from the ministry in the past. He mentioned that the ministry seized a 21-ton cargo of pesticides in Jabal Al-Nar in Taiz, and another 12 containers in Aden from an importer accused of importing a previous cargo of poisonous pesticides. He said that these issues have been transferred to the public prosecution, which hasn't made any decision on them yet.
Al-Hawshabi added, “The problem isn't in seizing these poisons; the stores of the ministry are full of them and using them will cause a catastrophe for the environment. What we need is to enforce the importers to get them back to their country of origin.”
Parliament neither advocated cooperating with nor to punishing the ministry. It didn't excuse the ministry from responsibility, but suggested publishing a black list of smugglers' names through the mass media. Moreover, the MPs asked that the officials who facilitated the passing of the banned cargo through Haradh strait be taken off the job and transferred to prosecution to be held accountable for their actions.
Two recent studies conducted at the University of Aden found that 118 kinds of pesticides are used in Yemen, mostly by qat farmers.
According to one study conducted by Abdul-Rahman Alawi bin Yehia, a researcher in the Environmental Studies and Sciences Center at the university, Yemen imports these pesticides under 555 trade names, and most of them are very dangerous.
Another study conducted by pharmacy students at the university stated that these pesticides cause chronic diseases such as cancer, behavioral changes, and liver and kidney diseases.
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