There is huge attention to oil resumption in Ogoni areas of Rivers State, South-South Nigeria. This is as it is clear President Bola Ahmed Tinubu wants oil business to resume in Ogoni which has four local council areas.
Should Ogoni oil or OML 11 resume today, Nigeria’s desire to hit over 2m barrels per day (2mbpd) would be realized and the budget may have brighter hope.
This is because OML 11 holds 33 oil wells that can spill 250,000 bpd. To put FG proboscis into this well, the Ogoni people must be pacified. Yet, there are many other oil assets around the Niger Delta that could fetch more oil to Nigeria on the road to 4mbpd. More pacification may be needed to calm the oil region down and drill their oil.
The federal government of Nigeria has over the years relied on the $1bn cleanup to pacify the Ogoni people and drill the oil under their feet. The cleanup is being handled by the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) which was set up to carry out the cleanup. This in itself seems to have been bugged by many obstacles, making the cleaner to need help.
The Olusegun Obasanjo presidency brought in the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP), an arm of the United Nations (UN), in 2006, to carry out an independent audit of the oil spill that caused all the raucous in Ogoni areas and led to the hanging of the Ogoni 9 led by the world-renowned playwright, Ken Saro Wiwa.
The UNEP effort suffered many setbacks and objections in the Ogoni area but its eventual report in August 2011 came when a Niger Deltan, Goodluck Jonathan, was president of Nigeria.
Many expected the UNEP Report and the cleanup to receive expedited action being that a son of the oil region was head of the country. This appeared to be the opposite (for reasons not subject of this piece). Rather, Jonathan set up HYPREP which many said was for Niger Delta, not Ogoni-specific when the UNEP Report was Ogoni-specific. This alone created doubts in the real motive of the Jonathan-led Federal Government and the Ogoni cleanup. Political opponents feasted on this, and HYPREP remained idle until 2016 when President Muhammadu Buhari came to power in 2015 and took action. The cleanup was finally flagged off.
Read also: Tinubu wants to drill Ogoni oil but cleanup drags
The challenge was that HYPREP was seen to be unwieldy and full of bureaucracy. It has a Governing Council which acts as the clearing house, it has Board of Trusteed (BoT), and Management under the Project Coordination Office (PCO). Yet, all these organs report to the Minister, the Federal Executive Council (FEC), the Presidency, and the National Assembly that has two houses and two committees for oversight.
The oil majors that contributed the $1bn also have layers of oversight. It was argued that before any job would be awarded, several interests and authorities would descend and exercise influence, for good or bad. Besides, HYPREP began under the Ministry of Petroleum in the Jonathan administration but moved to the Ministry of Environment during Buhari. These added more burdens on the Agency in trying to get started. It may also have created additional schism and intra-ministerial coldness that may have affected HYPREP.
The major python on ground waiting to swallow the new baby (HYPREP) was expectation crisis whereby the Ogoni people who initially rejected the UNEP team now expected financial compensation in terms of cash handouts. At least, they expected their young and educated people to be given direct jobs on day one. Some chiefs were quoted to have demanded for cash allocations to go ‘clean’ their areas. Some chiefs and strong men are said to have even to this day fenced off areas of polluted land as theirs, asking to be allowed and funded to clean the places.
In Ogoni as in most oil communities, there is usually a big problem of who owns the land. Most families claim to own the piece of land where oil is found, but oil activities usually spread beyond that well head area because pollution goes far and wide. So, according to sources, there is usually a dispute between landlord of well head area and landlords of polluted areas, let alone political leaders of an area that may bulldoze their way into the front to demand to represent a community. There is also the issue of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) who led the struggle that brought the benefits and who lost men. They are said to stand against any dialogue of negotiation between the government or any oil company with any community without them. This too seems to create the counter statements that emanate from the area on almost every issue under the sun. Often, MOSOP is divided into factions, thus making the counter statements to be more multiple. This seems to have created huge smoke of confusion in Ogoni and seems to have made it intractable how to discuss and resolve the Ogoni crisis for oil to resume.
These factors plus elements of corruption that cannot be ruled out in any transaction in most Nigerian affairs were said to be reason for frequent change in leadership of HYPREP, also adding its own disruption. Little wonder when the present Project Coordinator (PC), a professor, Nenibarini Zabbey, who was not long on seat, was removed and replaced with a western Nigerian professor, hell broke loose and Zabbey was returned immediately. This seemed to send a big warning to the natives that too much infighting could lead to total loss of headship opportunity of HYPREP.
The biggest obstacle so far, according to experts and non-governmental organisations monitoring HYPREP, could be approval processes. The multinationals that release the $1bn in tranches every year demand for world class accounting and transparency processes as condition for further release. The operators at the PCO have many masters to answer to from the BoT to Governing Council to FEC to the Presidency to the NASS committees, thus needing to satisfy many standards and pressures and demands.
In Nigeria where lawmakers regard oversight as weapon to directly run a government agency, else withhold their budget, and a country where supervising ministries seem to want to appropriate funds of agencies under them, many sources say getting papers passed in HYPREP may seem like the proverbial camel attempting to pass through the eye of a needle. Different amounts need different layers of approval, whereas variations often get stuck.
Feats despite obstacles:
Enuolare Mba-Nwigoh, the present Head, Communications at HYPREP, oozed with confidence and certainty when he spoke with BusinessDay in the week about the things the embattled organization has managed to put on ground for the numerous Thomases to see.
HYPREP was fundamentally created to carry out clean up through remediation activities. Nwigoh produced documents that indicated that 39 lots have so far been cleaned up as well as 34 shoreline projects carried out. Mangrove restoration is also part of its mandate and 10m trees are to be planted over all. He said 1.1m has been done and 4m is being targeted next on the road to 10m. Project execution is 71%, he said.
The cleaning is said to have moved to segment termed ‘High Risk Project Sites’. These are serious because they involve closeness to humans including shrines. “It requires participation of international partners. Scoping is going on now. Sight characterization exercise is going on.”
HYPREP was mandated to set up a Centre of Excellence to carry out many programmes. He said the construction is 78% completed.
Water supply seems to be sensitive in Ogoni because UNEP Report bemoaned high benzene level 900% above World Health Organisation (WHO) levels. It was recommended as first line of action. Whereas the Report named specific towns for water intervention, but Nwigoh said HYPREP was working to cover all of Ogoni. So far, 2o towns, according to records, have been covered such as in Alesa, Eteo, Onne, Ebubu/Nsissioken-Ogale Eleme LGA; Gokana: Terabo/Biara; Bodo, etc; Khana (Bori, Kpaen, Zaakpon) Buan, Bane; Tai; Kpite/horo.
As many projects spring up in Ogoni, HYPREP says it is executing a power supply project for 132KVA to link Ogoni to the national grid as well as solar panels in six communities with two transmission stations of 132kva to connect to the national grid (Bodo and Wiikara) now in 24 communities (phase two in 2025 is about distribution).
This has however recorded some hitches where jobs awarded in 2021 with 2020 bids now need variation. “Now, inflation has affected the costs and the contractors are demanding for variation. Most of the facilities need solar because they cannot keep up with cost of diesel.”
Public Health is seen as another critical area of attention in the Ogoni crisis. HYPREP says it has launched medical outreach to over 7000 patients with over 800 of them getting eye glasses.
There is the Centre of Excellence with two faculties planned to be an international research centre with international partners. There are two healthcare facilities; the 100-bed Ogoni Specialist Centre with Oncology Department in Tai LGA and the Buan Cottage Hospital in Khana, Nwigoh said.
There is going to be a health impact study of Ogoni with WHO to see if there is a connection between sicknesses in Ogoni and hydrocarbon presence. He said HYPREP is strengthening four health centres in Ogoni (Bori, Terabo, Nchia, Kpite) with four more to come in 2025.
Most Ogoni activists make it look like the UNEP Report was too dry and had no human face. The document however talked about Livelihood programme to empower humans. Here, HYPREP said it has trained 5000 Ogoni youths in 20 skill areas to make them top picks in the industry. Some 60 SMEs have been empowered with N300,000 each, with more to come. Nano businesses are also to be assisted.
To support families the mangrove scheme is said to have trained 90 persons on mangrove nursery grooming and planting of three species. So, far, over 4m seedlings are said to be ready. Also, 300 Ogoni persons have been sponsored to post graduate studies costing over N200m.
The head of communications said there is socio-economic study of Ogoni coming. “It will help understand where help is needed and the form, for maximum impact. It will provide a template or roadmap for the socio-economic development of Ogoni. It is being handled by a think-tank of professors and experts to come up with data on all classes of Ogoni demography.”
In creating over 7000 jobs so far in Ogoni, the 39 lots cleaned up enabled each to give jobs to 30 community workers. The 34 shoreline projects already done fetched 2,500 community workers trained in IMO Certification levels one and two.
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