Kelechi Esogwa-Amadi
When the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) presented the full report of its study on the oil spill in Ogoni Land in 2011, with a recommendation that the clean-up exercise should commence without delay to save the lives of the people of Ogoni before it’s too late, hopes were high that the federal government would expedite action on the project with the speed of lightning, given the fact that the man at the helm of Nigeria’s affairs then was a son of Niger Delta – then President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan.
Unfortunately, the Jonathan-controlled federal government failed to live up to expectation, to the shock and chagrin of all Ogoni people and concerned Niger Deltans. As president and commander-in-chief, he had everything at his disposal to galvanise action towards actualization of the first phase of six-phase project, which entailed a joint contribution of one billion dollars ($1,000,000,000.00) by the federal government and the oil companies, particularly Shell, for the first phase that is supposed to last for five years. According to UNEP, the cleanup exercise is supposed to last for thirty years. All that the Jonathan-led government needed was the political will. Unfortunately, they could not do it until the baton of leadership changed hands in 20115.
When President Muhammadu Buhari took over the reins of office on May 29, 2015, he did not waste time before raising the hopes of Ogoni people that he was ready to carry out the project, as he set up a committee and released ten million dollars for logistics. Many thought he would run with the vision. But four years after, not even the initial fund of $1bn has been released; not even an alternative good drinking water and health scheme, which UNEP recommended, have been provided.
The Hydrocarbon Pollution and Remediation Project (HYPREP), the federal government agency assigned with the responsibility of overseeing the clean-up, appears to be playing politics with the project. Close watchers believe that HYPREP is dancing the tunes being played by the federal government.
Many believe that their refusal to allow oil companies to resume exploration in their land as a condition for the cleanup is the reason why the federal government has not commenced the exercise. Why the federal government would even think of resuming oil exploration without first cleaning up oil spill that has destroyed lives and property, including farmland and aquatic life which all constitute the people’s means of livelihood remains unfathomable.
Apart from making the whole process look political, it also makes it look like a big sham. It simply smacks of insincerity, deceit and mischief on the part of the federal government whose primary responsibility should be the protection of lives and property of its citizens.
The fact that the federal government, in March 2018, approved a budget that was slightly below $150m instead of the UNEP-recommended $200m; the fact that the multinational oil companies and their joint venture partner, the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) have paid their counterpart funding of about $177m while the federal government-owned Port Harcourt refinery is yet to pay its balance $23m and the fact that HYPREP has allegedly spent the ten million dollars ($10,000,000.00) paid by Shell and is busy looking for contractors without first providing the alternative water and health management centre recommended by UNEP, all point to the politicization of the Ogoni clean-up project.
The only way the federal government can convince Ogoni people, Niger Deltans, Nigerians and the world at large is by commencing the clean-up exercise without further delay. This will also help to save the thousands of lives of Ogonis who are allegedly dying monthly due to the polluted environment caused by oil exploration. UNEP, in its report, described the Ogoni oil spill as a tragic legacy of oil activities. A stitch in time saves nine.
