Ogoni youths under the aegis of the Ogoni Youth Federation (OYF) have called on the management of the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) to review the proposed Ogoni water project to include communities they said were “conspicuously omitted.”
In an interactive session with HYREP in Port Harcourt on Friday, the President-General of OYF, Legborsi Yamaabana regretted that some communities, including Bangha Community, were omitted from communities to benefit from the proposed water project despite being an oil-producing community.
Yamaabana urged HYPREP to include Bangha Community and other excluded communities in the water project design for the overall interest of all stakeholders.
Meanwhile, a statement by the group’s publicity secretary, Lene Kingsley Lekue said the Ogoni Youth Leader also demanded the review of the profile of HYPREP contractors and their employment casualization scheme for Ogoni youths.
He said this is with a view to exposing the “flagrant violation of Section 7 of the Labour Act, Cap L1, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria 2004 by HYPREP and its contractors,” alleging that Ogoni youths working with HYPREP contractors were neither paid evenly or given employment letters even after several years of working.
Yamaabana further urged HYPREP to use money from the Ogoni Trust Fund to send Ogoni students on foreign scholarships, noting that “the Ogoni of our dream can only be achieved through equipping our youths with quality education.”
He stated that further award of contracts by HYPREP without observing local content principles would be “vehemently resisted”, as he warned that the youths were running out of patience with the project.
 have called on the management of the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) to review the proposed Ogoni water project to include communities they said were "conspicuously omitted."){kind=link}