The gesture by the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration to pacify Ogoni ethnic nationality in Rivers State with a university may have been marred by an oil spill that exploded in Ogoni just as the signature was being penned in Abuja.
Crude oil spill was been reported in Ogale in Eleme Local Government Area of Rivers State, February 3, 2025, thus welcoming the Federal University of Environmental Technology, Ogoni. The university was established same day by President Tinubu through his assent to a bill passed by the National Assembly sponsored by a senator, Bari Mpigi, representing the Rivers South-East Senatorial District.
The spill was confirmed by field men from the Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre’s (YEAC-Nigeria) who have what they call “One Million Youth Volunteers Network of Human Rights Defenders and Promoters in the Niger Delta”. They were said to have reported the spill in the area reported to the YEAC that the oil spill allegedly occurred on February at the Ogale Manifold.
The volunteers were said to have also reported to YEAC-Nigeria that the manifold spill, after it filled the underground pits, started flowing freely to the pipeline right of way that separated Lot-1 of the Ogoni cleanup Project of the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) of the Federal Ministry of Environment in Ogale.
Read also: Tinubu approves establishment of University of Environment in Ogoniland, Rivers
The volunteers said they suspected that the spill at the manifold owned and operated b y Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) of Nigeria, a company that has been in court with the community in the United Kingdom over previous oil spill.
According to a YEAC statement, the volunteers reported and decried the associated violence and alleged application of force by some youth elements in Eleme by invading the spill site with alleged armed boys, confiscating trucks that were being used to evacuate the spilled crude oil, beating up some of the drivers whose trucks were already seized and parked at the Eleme Council Secretariat and injuring some persons in the process. One person was allegedly stabbed on the head by some of the boys reported to have invaded the scene with dangerous small arms and light weapons including guns.
YEAC called on the police to launch investigation into the incident with a view of restoring peace among the warring parties.
YEAC, through its Crude Oil Spill Alert System (COSAS), in a statement in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, signed by its Executive Director, Fyneface Dumnamene Fyneface, called on the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA) to carry out a joint investigation visit (JIV) on the spill site, invoke sections of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA), 2021 and ensure that containment and clean-up were done with adequate compensation paid to those whose economic crops have been impacted by the spill in the area.
No official reaction from either the police or NOSDRA has reacted to media inquiries.
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