Dear Netters:
This article is by Nina Lakhani which appeared in the Independent
today(3 111 2011) I am reproducing it below.
In another article in the same page Nina says: The toxic legacy
remains, 27 years on. I regret I failed to link up this part
-bhuban
WHY HAS BHOPAL POISONER BEEN GIVEN 2012 DEAL, MPS ASK COE
Nov 3 2011 by Jade in Brighton
Dow’s Contract Gives It Exclusive Marketing Rights To The Main Stadium
In East London.
Lord Coe faced tough questions from senior MPs yesterday regarding a
lucrative Olympic contract awarded to a controversial American
chemicals company that campaigners say will taint London 2012.
The shadow Olympics minister, Tessa Jowell, and the chair of the Home
Affairs Select Committee, Keith Vaz, yesterday held private talks with
Lord Coe, who was asked to justify the £7m deal with the Dow Chemical
Company (Dow), which has been accused of failing to address one of last
century’s worst corporate human-rights disasters. Dow officials will be
invited to attend further talks next week after Lord Coe failed to
satisfy MPs that Dow does meet London 2012′s ethical code.
Dow is the 100 per cent owner of Union Carbide Corporation (UCC), the
company responsible for the 1984 gas disaster in Bhopal, India, which
survivor groups say killed 25,000 people.
Dow’s contract gives it “exclusive marketing rights” to the main
stadium in east London. Its name will be adorned on the “wrap” around
the stadium, guaranteeing the company a prominent profile next year.
Dow bought UCC in 2001 and denies any responsibility for UCC
liabilities in Bhopal – which Locog accepts. Dow claims the $470m paid
by UCC in 1991 for the disaster victims (currently contested in the
Supreme Court) was final. Yet Dow and UCC are defendants in an Indian
Public Interest Litigation case for clean-up the factory site. Last
year, India’s government blacklisted Dow AgroSciences India for five
years for bribing government officials to expedite registration of
three pesticides. Dow AgroSciences is a wholly owned Dow subsidiary.
Mr Vaz said: “The best course of action is for Dow to withdraw until
the issues in Bhopal have been resolved, but I am happy to hear what
they have to say. This is not the right kind of sponsorship for the
world’s greenest Olympics.” Ms Jowell said discussions about Dow’s
involvement would continue.
Tim Edwards, a trustee of the Bhopal Medical Appeal, said MPs must
beware of Dow’s well-oiled PR machine. “Dow’s public-relations work on
Bhopal exemplifies the slippery art of evasion. But in rarely seen
regulatory filings, Dow rather frankly describes Union Carbide as part
of its global business… Dow seems to think it is above the law, and
Locog appears to agree.”
The meeting came amid growing pressure from a cross-party campaign to
make Locog reverse its decision. Barry Gardiner MP, chair of Labour
Friends of India, said: “I urge Locog to think again in order to
protect the reputation of the Olympic legacy for Britain. Its failure
to take the victims of Bhopal and ongoing contamination into account is
particularly ironic given the UK Government had to spend £12.7m
cleaning up the Olympic site, which was ‘grossly contaminated’ by toxic
waste.”
Eyewitness: The toxic legacy remains, 27 years on
Almost 27 years after the world’s worst industrial disaster struck
Bhopal, the abandoned gas factory and its toxic waste are part of daily
life for tens of thousands of poor families.
Around the streets behind the factory, adults were either filling up
pots and urns with clean water – through taps installed three months
earlier – or else bathing their children. Campaigners won a hard-fought
battle in 2004 when the Supreme Court ordered the state government to
provide Bhopalis with clean water. And slowly water pipes are being
fitted into the homes of all affected communities. But water is scarce,
so the taps stop flowing after 30 minutes and families have to make
stores last for 48 hours. This means most still rely on dirty ground
water from hand pumps when the urns run dry. “We know the ground water
is dirty, it smells funny, but what can we do?” said Habib Khan, 46.
Soon after the Union Carbide factory opened in the 1970s, waste was
dumped in three solar evaporation ponds. Documents show the ponds were
“almost emptied” through leaky lining by 1982. These have seeped into
water sources over the past three decades; monsoon rains spread the
toxins further.
Campaigners believe this is the cause of high rates of congenital
deformities, cancers, respiratory and endocrine problems among
communities to poor to move.
Dow, which bought Union Carbide in 2001, rejects claims that it
inherited the company’s liabilities, yet in the US it settled
asbestos-related claims dating back to the early 1970s.
By Nina Lakhani
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