La foresta che circonda il Parco Nazionale di Cross River in Nigeria è uno degli ecosistemi più ricchi di biodiversità dell’Africa occidentale. Questa foresta è l'habitat di numerose specie di uccelli, scimpanzé, bufali selvatici e una delle ultime popolazioni di elefanti di foresta di questa regione. Per generazioni, il popolo indigeno degli Ekuri ha abitato questa foresta e l’ha preservata.
For generations, the Ekuri people have relied completely on their ancestral forest for all of their needs. It provides not only fruits, vegetables and other forest products but also their medicines and shapes their unique culture, language and identity. The Ekuri Initiative NGO was established to protect their forests and has successfully brought development benefits to their villages at the same time. But now this forest, and with it the entire Ekuri way of life, is threatened with destruction.
The governor of Cross River State, Ben Ayade, has announced the construction of a 260 km superhighway to go from the coastal city of Calabar to a small town called Katsina-ala in Benue State to the north. The highway has no obvious economic benefit and is, in effect, a road to nowhere.
The superhighway will rip through the heart of the Ekuri rainforest, opening it up to farming, logging and hunting on a massive scale. Worse still – in a massive, unprecedented land grab, the Governor has seized a 20 km wide swathe of ancestral land of thousands of other forest-dependent villagers along the entire 260 km length of the 6-lane superhighway!
The Ekuri know that their forest, homes and way of life are at stake. They intend to protect their forest through peaceful protest and are calling on us for international support.
The Ekuri blocked the arriving bulldozers from entering the forest and refused to accommodate the construction workers. The workers have since begun destroying the forest in a neighboring community. Rainforest Rescue ask to sign a petition to the Nigerian government.