Decomposing Whale stalls fishing activities at Mfanti

Residents of Mfanti, a fishing community near Half Assini in the Jomoro District of the Western Region, are complaining of foul odor produced by a decomposing Whale that was washed ashore last Saturday.

The creature, residents reveal, has been left at the shore of a local beach in the area with no effort by traditional authorities in collaboration with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to dispose it of.

Holyson Dandey, a resident who spoke to a sister website ultimate1069.com, indicate that fishing activities in the area have been slowed down in view of the pungent smell produced by the mammal.

“As in the case, the traditional authorities are supposed to perform some rituals before the creature is buried but that is yet to be done,” he revealed.

Whales in the past have been washed ashore along the Western coast of Ghana over the past six months in circumstances that have alarmed local fishermen and environmentalists.

While the fishermen and environmentalists have linked the death to the oil production activities in the Jubilee Field, officials of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) say there is no scientific proof of that yet.

According to an expert in marine mammals at the Department of Oceanography and Fisheries at the University of Ghana, Professor Patrick Kwabena Ofori-Danson, apart from environmental pollution, whales could also die from eating harmful substances.

Mr Kojo Agbenor-Efunam, the Principal Programme Officer responsible for oil and gas at the EPA, however, delinked the fate of the whales from any oil spillage, saying that what had been spilled so far was harmless because it was neither poisonous nor toxic.

In December 2009, March 2010 and May 2010, Kosmos Energy, Texas-based oil and gas Exploration Company and one of the major partners in the Jubilee Field, spilled offshore 706 barrels of what was described as toxic substances and for which the company was fined by the Ghana government.