Tina Amanda
The Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre, YEAC-Nigeria has proffered solutions to the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) on the re-pollution of Ogoni land through illegal oil bunkering activities and artisanal refineries.
YEAC-Nigeria advised HYPREP to create a database for those involved in artisanal refining activities with the aim of providing them alternative livelihood opportunities, partnering with development agencies for modular refineries, supporting the establishment of PACORDI, providing electricity for entrepreneurship, empowerment, skills acquisition, and scholarships.
Executive Director of YEAC-Nigeria, Comrade Fyneface Dumnamene Fyneface, gave the suggestion during the sensitization of ex-artisanal refiners in Ogoniland against re-pollution organized by HYPREP in Mogho, Gokana Local Government Area of Rivers State.
Fyneface, represented by Frank Nornubari, Advocacy Centre’s Research and Development Officer, in a presentation titled, ‘Alternative Livelihood Opportunities for ex-artisanal refiners in Ogoniland’ urged HYPREP to adopt, support, scale down, and join to facilitate these initiatives for ex-artisanal refiners and youths of Ogoni to prevent re-pollution for the environmental restoration of Ogoniland.
According to him, the program’s aim was to sensitize artisanal and ex-artisanal refiners in Ogoni against involvement in acts of illegal refining that contribute to pollution and re-pollution as the implementation of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Report on Ogoni 2011 is ongoing.
“HYPREP needs to commence the process of providing sustainable alternative livelihood opportunities for artisanal and ex-artisanal refiners in Ogoni by having a database of those involved. YEAC-Nigeria will work with HYPREP to extract records of artisanal refiners in Ogoni, update it, and present them for use to ease the planning and implementation of opportunities for ex-artisanal refiners.
“In February 2017, the Federal Government through former Vice President Yemi Osinbanjo announced plans to establish modular refineries for artisanal refiners in the Niger Delta as alternative livelihood opportunities. As such, YEAC-Nigeria, registered with Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) on November 7, 2017 “to campaign against oil theft, artisanal refining and pollution” among others became the first organization to be so mandated by the government and on November 28, 2017.
“On July 27, 2020, the Executive Director Fyneface, conceived and publicized PACORDI which proposes the innovation, modernization, standardization, legalization, and integration of artisanal refineries into the national economy as a corresponding organized crime mitigation mechanism for artisanal crude oil refiners in the Niger Delta like the illegal gold miners in parts of the North and Western Nigeria that the Presidential Artisanal Gold Mining Development Initiative (PAGMI) established for them to mitigate organized crime in gold mining.
“HYPREP can work through its parent Ministry of Environment for the Honourable Minister to present this proposal to Mr. President in a memo to the Executive Council for the establishment of PACORDI as an alternative livelihood opportunity for artisanal refiners in the Niger Delta and Nigeria including Ogoni to prevent re-pollution for HYPREP’s ongoing Clean-Up started in Ogoni as a model for other communities in the Niger Delta to succeed.
“YEAC-Nigeria believes that the intervention of HYPREP to stop re-pollution in Ogoni through alternative livelihood opportunities as recommended by UNEP Report is a form of amnesty for artisanal refiners and should be given priority attention for the Ogoni cleanup to succeed”.
He further called for the provision of steady and uninterrupted electricity in Ogoniland which will serve as an avenue to provide alternative livelihood opportunities for artisanal refiners in Ogoni and boost business opportunities.
He explained that through the database created, the skills and areas of competencies of artisanal refiners can be identified, further developed, and empowered by HYPREP for self-employment and job creation for other members of the Ogoni community to also benefit. Noting it will boost the local economy through the value chains and disabuse the minds of the ex-artisanal refiners from returning to their old ways to re-pollute the Ogoni environment.
Fyneface, however, called for national and overseas scholarships to be given to artisanal and ex-artisanal refiners in Ogoni by HYPREP to study, as to improve their lives and stop artisanal refineries that contribute to re-pollution.
