- The clean-up of Ogoni land, flagged off over a year ago is yet to kick off
The Federal Government will do well to drive the commencement of work on what may well be the most significant project of this dispensation. Upon assumption of office in May, 2015, the Muhammadu Buhari administration had pledged to clean up Ogoni land. Considered the heart of the Niger Delta area of Nigeria, it is perhaps the most polluted spot in the entire oil-drilling communities of the world.
About six years ago, the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) had carried out a survey of the magnitude of hydrocarbons pollution in the Niger Delta and had determined that Ogoni land needed to be reclaimed through a comprehensive cleanup of the years of oil spill that had blighted the environment of this oil-rich community. It was this report which caught the attention of President Buhari upon assumption of office. The sum of $5 million was immediately set aside and all machinery for execution was kick-started.
Former Minister for Environment, Mrs Amina Mohammed, seemed to have driven that process while she was still in charge. Numerous preliminary stakeholders’ meetings in Abuja, Lagos, Yenagoa, Bori were swiftly held under her watch. And stakeholder appraisal and buy-in were crucial because the project involves a diverse crowd of various federal ministries and agencies, state governments, community leaders, youths, environmental rights groups, Niger Delta activist groups, international oil companies and multilateral organisations like the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
After this crucial leg of consultations and consensus building, came the next stage of constituting the board of trustees and selecting the core personnel to lead the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP), the body to take charge of the task. Reportedly, out of over 300 applicants for the job, Dr. Marvin Dekil, an indigene, emerged successful as HYPREP national coordinator.
The governing council has been inaugurated; HYPREP sensitisation exercises have been on-going in the affected local government areas, prelude to the official inauguration of the project. In June last year, Acting President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, in the company of Mrs Mohammed and the governors of Rivers and Bayelsa states performed the official flag-off of the clean-up project.
Over one year has passed since the kick-off, yet the actual work of cleaning up the long-polluted Niger Delta is yet to start. Not even equipment and machinery needed for the exercise have been sighted at the designated sites. Apart from the actual work of ridding the rivers, swamps and creeks of dark smudges of crude oil slick, part of the project is said to include provision of palliative amenities like pipe-borne water, and basic health facilities are yet to materialise.
Reasons for the seeming inertia and what the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP) has described as “immorally too slow” work are hazy but may not be unconnected to funding. According to reports, Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) which was to provide the initial take-off fund has not been forthcoming. The foreign exchange hiccup and acute economic recession of last year may have also affected the funding schedules of the project and its eventual take-off.
But no clear answer is available as to the forlorn state of the project. Information from the Ministry of Environment suggests that it is only concerned with the preliminary stages which have been concluded and handed over to HYPREP.
But more than one year has passed since then, yet work has not begun. Though much preliminary work has been done, actual clean-up remains a mirage.
We urge the Federal Government to get off its back and get this project back on track immediately. This would be one of the legacy projects of this administration which has been much publicised as such. Apart from funding from UNEP and IOCs, government must set aside a special fund to ensure an expedited execution.
Apart from the international angle, this clean-up of Ogoniland would represent the first major attempt at remediation of the much violated environment of the Niger Delta area. It is a most crucial project.
