Hundreds of locals from Unity State capital Bentiu and the surrounding areas have taken to the River Naam to clear the swamps and water hyacinth in defiance of the state government directives. | Courtesy.

An official has expressed worries over the safety of hundreds of Bentiu residents who unilaterally started clearing weeds on the Naam River.

On Thursday, the civilians got into the river with machetes, sickles, hoes and shovels to remove the quagmire of swamps, believed to have obstructed the water flow into the Nile River.

A video footages and photos seen by Eye Radio showed a crowd of civilians inside and along the bank of the river, manually cutting water hyacinths with their hand tools.

He warned the defiant locals against aquatic animals including snakes.

“Hundreds have humped into the river in order to remove those weeds and I think that is a safety concern because we have snakes, we have other aquatic animals and we don’t want to lose lives when people would like to serve lives,” said Joseph Africano, the Undersecretary at the national Ministry of Environment.

The move came a few days after President Salva Kiir suspended dredging related activities on the Naam and Bahr el Ghazal basin, pending environmental impact assessment.

However, in the national capital Juba, environmental experts and academia continue to voice fears of possible danger of the project.

They called on the government to first carry out an environmental and social impact assessment before dredging the Nile tributaries.