As HYPREP restores the glory of Ogoniland

As HYPREP restores the glory of Ogoniland

By Ikechukwu Amaechi

Visiting Ogoniland last week after my first visit in 1996 was a bittersweet experience. The difference between then and now is unbelievable! I went to Ogoni the first time to chronicle the mess oil industry and the Nigerian state had made of the place.

Before oil was discovered in K-Dere community, popularly called the Bomu oil fields, the territory made up of six kingdoms – Babbe, Eleme, Gokana, Ken-Khana, Nyo-Khana, and Tai – and now compressed into four local governments: Eleme, Gokana, Khana, and Tai, which covers approximately 1,000 square kilometres, with a population of about 832,000, according to 2006 census, was an agricultural and fishing paradise.

That changed with the coming of first Bomu oil well in 1958. Subsequently, Shell Petroleum, the British multinational oil and gas company headquartered in London, made more discoveries in other Ogoni communities including Ebubu, Yorla, Bodo West and Korokoro, leading to the building of massive oil infrastructure, with crude oil pipelines crisscrossing the entire land.

When the oil started spilling, nothing was done to mitigate the looming danger until it became a catastrophe. An environmental assessment conducted by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) documented over 2,976 oil spills between 1976 and 1991. Consequentially, decades of unchecked spills and unmitigated gas flaring, which contaminated land, water and air, impacting the health and livelihoods of the people, turned what was hitherto the world’s third-largest mangrove ecosystem into an environmental disaster zone.

Out of the rubble of this existential crisis emerged the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), a non-governmental organization with the mandate to campaign non-violently to promote democratic awareness and protect Ogoni environment, vesting themselves with the Ogoni Bill of Rights in November 1990.

Tragically, barely four years thence, a split in the ranks of its leadership turned MOSOP into a movement for the death, not survival, of Ogoni people, with the gruesome murder, on May 21, 1994, of Albert Badey, Edward Kobani, Theophilus Orage and Samuel Orage, in Giokoo community, Gokana. More Ogoni blood subsequently flowed when the ruling military junta blamed Ken Saro-Wiwa, a social rights activist, and eight of his compatriots for the killings. Tried and convicted, Saro-Wiwa, Saturday Dobee, Nordu Eawo, Daniel Gbooko, Paul Levera, Felix Nuate, Baribor Bera, Barinem Kiobel, and John Kpuine, were executed on November 10, 1995, in Port Harcourt.

So, the Ogoni I visited in 1996 was a community under siege, occupied by the Nigerian military, with the people distraught, melancholic and forlorn. They walked around listlessly, their heads bowed in utter defeat and surrender. The bitterness was palpable and the differences between the Ogoni 4 and Ogoni 9 camps seemingly irreconcilable. For instance, while Saro-Wiwa’s parents who I met in Bane, their ancestral village, in Khana, mourned the loss of their son, the Kobanis who I visited in their Port Harcourt GRA home were implacable. But having lost 13 of their leaders, Ogoniland was the ultimate loser.

That was until 2008, when at the behest of the Nigerian government, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) conducted an independent assessment of the environment and public health impacts of oil contamination in Ogoniland. Over a 14-month period, with over 4,000 samples collected for analysis from more than 200 sites, 122 kilometres of pipeline rights of way surveyed, more than 5,000 medical records reviewed and engagement of over 23,000 people at local community meetings, UNEP’s verdict was damning: Ogoniland had become a wasteland, which, unless immediate remediation steps were taking, may well become the world’s worst ecological disaster.

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The report, which was first published in 2011 indicated that pollution from over 50 years of oil operations in Ogoniland had penetrated further and deeper than many had thought. But nothing was done until the Federal Ministry of Environment in a 2016 Gazette, established the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) to implement the report. Its mandate included initiating and developing programmes to remedy hydrocarbon-impacted areas; ensuring full recovery of the ecosystem; providing appropriate technologies for remediation of the soil and groundwater; and responding to future remediation needs.

Gladly, this restoration project is turning out to be the world’s most wide-ranging and long-term oil clean-up exercise given the fact that contaminated drinking water, land, creeks and important ecosystems such as mangroves are being systematically brought back to full, productive health.

With the dual mandate of remediating hydrocarbon impacted communities and restoring livelihoods in Ogoniland, HYPREP has done an incredible job. It is to the HYPREP restored Ogoni community that I returned to last week and it was a soul-lifting experience. Contrasted with 1996, Ogoni is now a land on the cusp of renaissance. The air is fresh – clean, invigorating and free from stale smells of the 1990s, greener vegetation, aquatic life is mostly restored and the people now walk around with a spring in their step. The dignity of the Ogoni people is being gradually, albeit systematically restored, courtesy of the work HYPREP is doing.

 As Prof Nenibarini Zabbey, the project coordinator, said, “HYPREP has achieved significant milestones,” working endlessly to address the devastation caused by oil spills, gas flaring and other pollutants in the area. Beyond the core value of remediation, the agency is adding electricity, healthcare delivery services and potable water facilities to its remit to spur economic activities. “What we are doing is a sustainable clean-up project and we are in conformity with the original mandate of UNEP while we are also adding values,” Zabbey said.

The projects are panoramic and breathtaking. For instance, at one of its 39 medium risk sites for soil and groundwater remediation at Ajen-Okpori, Eleme, Israel Sigalo, the team lead, remediation execution, environmental remediation unit of HYPREP, explained the incredible remediation processes and techniques. So far, 48 lots have been completed and certified by the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA) in the first and second phases of the project, while work on 39 medium risk lots is ongoing, as it is also in 34 shoreline lots where 2,500 youths trained in International Maritime Organisation levels one and two certifications, basic remediation techniques with health safety and environment skills are currently employed as community workers. At the simple risk site in Obolo, Eleme, which has been completed, and the re-vegetation of remediated land undertaken, lush vegetation is already visible.

Yet, it was another experience at Goi and Kpor, Gokana, where two of the 34 lots for the ongoing shoreline cleanup, witnessed active remediation activities. Peter Lenu, technical adviser to the project coordinator on shoreline cleanup explained how low-pressure active flushing of the sediments was deployed in removing hydrocarbon residue. Here, experts skillfully separated hydrocarbons from the soil using low-pressure water, manually removing contaminants while keeping the water intact.

In Bomu, the host community for the mangrove project, well over 1.5 million mangrove seedlings have already been planted in HYPREP’s effort to recover 560 hectares of lost mangrove areas. Four million seedlings will be planted in the first phase of the project while a total 10 million seedlings will ultimately be planted. This holds significant benefit for restoration of ecosystem goods and services, fish production, climate change mitigation and adaptation. A sight of the healthy mangrove seedlings sprouting on the tidal flats of Bomu was rejuvenating.

But going beyond its core mandate, HYPREP has embarked on massive water project with water schemes in Alesa, Ebubu, Korokoro, Barako, Terabor, Kpean, Bomu, Kporghor, already completed. In healthcare, a specialist hospital, with an oncology department as special feature, is nearing completion in Kpite Tai, as well as Buan cottage hospital in Ken-Khana. Besides, primary health centres in Bori, Terabor, Nchia and Kpite, are being strengthened, while health outreaches benefitting over 10,000 Ogonis are carried out. Moreover, the Ogoni health impact study, as recommended by the UNEP report of 2011, will be conducted by the World Health Organisation (WHO) this quarter.

But it is in the area of livelihoods where 5,000 Ogoni women and youths have been trained in 20 skill sets that the most intangible impacts are being made. There has also been training for 200 farmers, aviation training for 30 youths, 60 SMEs entrepreneurs empowered with N300,000 each, 40 Nano businesses empowered with N100,000 each, education support of N250,000 paid to 200 final year students and award of N200 million scholarships to 300 Ogoni post-graduate students (200 Masters and 100 Doctoral). Specialised skills training is billed to commence in mechatronics, seafaring and creative arts.

The sheer scale of the project is mindboggling. But what is even more astounding is the fact that almost all the young men and women executing these highly technical jobs are Ogoni. And to ensure sustainability, HYPREP is also building the Centre of Excellence for Environmental Restoration (CEER), a project Prof Zabbey described as “a monumental step forward in the remediation of hydrocarbon pollution in Ogoni and beyond.”

The project coordinator said the Centre “presents itself as a citadel for the conduct of vital research on soil and water quality, providing invaluable data for future restoration work. It will also train local people on best practices in environmental management ensuring that they are directly involved in the healing process of their own land.”

Started in May 2023 on a 28.8 hectares of land, the Centre which will serve as a research hub for environmental restoration and training is a key component of the country’s effort not only to remedy the environment but also provide long-term, sustainable solution to the people.

“It is a symbol of hope, a place of learning and a hub for collaborating efforts in environmental restoration not just in Nigeria and Africa, but globally. It stands at the crossroads of science, community engagement and technology,” Zabbey ululated.  

And in compliance with Federal Government’s directive that HYPREP should contribute to national food security, Prof. Zabbey announced an expansion of the Centre’s original remediation-related laboratories to include biotechnology, which he explained, will enhance phytoremediation studies and crop improvement research to contribute to national food security and sovereignty.

“We have never had it so good,” crowed Gideon Nwielaghi, a 53-year-old indigene of Khana, who still remembers the mayhem of the 1990s as if it was yesterday. “I never believed I would witness the restoration of Ogoniland in my lifetime,” he said, wiping tears of joy from his eyes with a white handkerchief. That sentiment runs deep as HYPREP methodically restores the glory of the hitherto despoiled Ogoniland.