Residents of Alalubosa community in Government Reserved Area (GRA) of Ilorin, Kwara State, have heaved a big sigh of relief as the officers of National Environmental Standard and Regulation Enforcement Agency (NESREA) sealed off a facility housing a telecommunications mast located in the area.

Investigations conducted among members of the community revealed that the telecommunications mast, owned by one of the leading telecommunication companies in the country, had environmental and health impacts on residents of the area.

Speaking with the Community News while sealing off the telecommunications facility, the Kwara State Coordinator of the NESREA, Jacob Ayuba, said the erection of the mast had violated environmental standard guidelines.

He said the telecommunications company also violated a national rule called Environmental Impact Assessment Act of 1992, which states that environmental impact assessment should be carried out on any project to be installed to know the environmental impact of the facility on people, after which an approval letter would be issued.

Ayuba said the telecommunication outfit could not produce the approval letter on the installed mast after series of attempt made to verify the complaints leveled by the community.

NESREA coordinator, who also said that one of the regulations on telecommunication stipulates that a 10- metre distance must separate the wall of the base station and the wall of the next residential building was not obeyed, adding that the space between the facility and the next building was less than two metres.

He said the guidelines above were the basic concern of the complaints given by the community, among other national laws that he said were also violated, adding that the agency meant the action to serve as deterrent to others.

He said the agency would visit the sealed facility to check if the padlock put by the agency had been tampered with, adding that anything found out would be reported to the agency's headquarter for further sanctions.

Residents of Alalubosa community had made series of complaints to relevant agencies on physical and health problems that the telecommunications mast had caused in the area since it was installed, adding that walls of their buildings had cracked, noise pollution had caused migraine among other health problems, and that security of the area had also been threatened.