By Daniel Kanu
Assistant Politics Editor
Civil Society groups, Environmental Rights Action, Amnesty International, and Friends of the Earth Europe among others, have called for the immediate clean-up of Ogoniland in the Niger Delta region of the country as agreed in the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) report.
The groups were united in their statement as they expressed disappointment that one year after the implementation of UNEP’s report on Ogoniland was officially supposed to begin, the endangered communities were still waiting for the clean-up exercise to commence.
Since the current President, Muhammadu Buhari, was elected the governing structures for the UNEP implementation had been put in place and a coordinator was appointed to lead HYPREP, the implementation agency.
But the CSG’s say six years after publication of the UNEP Environmental Assessment of Ogoniland nothing tangible has been done to improve the agonizing situation on the ground.
ERA noted in a statement that “communities in Ogoniland are still waiting for clean-up and still waiting for the clean air, water, and the land they need to live a good life.
“Only 1 percent of the promised funds had been made available, a reported paltry $10 million of the required $1billion budget had been transferred.
“Some communities where UNEP found contaminated drinking water wells have never received any alternative source of drinking water.”
It noted further that “Shell continues to use the discredited RENA clean-up process despite UNEP’s clear recommendation that the process was ineffective and should be discontinued.
“The company also says it has revisited 15 oil spill sites identified by UNEP, and carried out further remediation at six of those sites. But this is misleading because UNEP found contamination at more than 50 Shell locations”.
Amnesty International investigation says it found that heavy contamination remained at 4 oil spill sites identified by UNEP, despite the fact remediation work had been carried out by Shell.
‘Six years after the UNEP report the communities of Ogoniland are still unacceptably waiting for action to clean up their land and water. Justice cannot be endlessly delayed, the Nigerian government needs to urgently ensure the plan is implemented immediately,’ said Godwin Ojo, Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria.
Colin Roche, of Friends of the Earth Europe said “It’s overdue that the start-up fund is immediately fully funded and the clean-up operation fully staffed. A clear priority should be the immediate delivery of all emergency and priority measures outlined in the UNEP report – no more delays”
Amnesty International noted that “It’s clear that Shell is using the Government clean-up process as an excuse for not properly cleaning-up past pollution. Its responsibility is clear, Shell must do the needful now.”
It would be recalled that the UNEP report called for the implementation of emergency measures, the establishment of a $1 billion start up fund and extensive clean-up of Ogoniland.
