Batchenga, 65 kilometers (40 miles) northeast of Cameroon’s capital Yaoundé, is slowly reopening. After serving as a ramp at the start of a national road linking the center region and Adamaoua in the north, it now owes its reputation to the construction of the Nachtigal hydroelectric power station.
The dam is financed and administered by Nachtigal Hydro Power Company (NHPC) and is being built over 1,797 hectares (4,440 acres) of land (the equivalent of over 2,500 professional soccer stadiums) declared as a public utility for the project. The dam aims to eventually supply 420 megawatts of electricity and boost national energy production by 30%, according to recent data provided by the Department of Water and Energy. It will be the largest project of its kind in the Central African sub-region, with undeniable economic potential.
However, like most large-scale projects, the dam’s construction has caused significant damage to the region’s biodiversity and has a list of socio-economic and environmental complaints that weigh on its shoulders.
According to a study conducted by Action for a Sustainable Environment (ASE), a Cameroonian civil society organization, the dam’s construction project will release approximately 469,342 tonnes of CO2 equivalent per year, a rate much higher than that foreseen by the project’s environmental assessment (200,800 tonnes of CO2 equivalent per year).
The community lost over 2,000 hectares (4,943 acres) of forest containing plants and other non-timber forest products. Sacred sites and medicinal plants have either been displaced or destroyed.
According to civil society organizations, this has led to food insecurity and a decline in nutritional status.
So far, community members are already experiencing the pressures of rain scarcity, a decrease in fish population, increased heat, loss of medicinal plants, and pollution of the air, soil and water. Women explained that access to water resources was already limited, especially during the dry season.
And now having a dam blocking access to the Sanaga River, (the largest river in Cameroon), whose tributaries span more than 13 hectares (about 32 acres), along with the 65 fish species that swim its currents, was the last straw.