As the Federal Government through its agency, the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project, HYPREP prepares for the actual clean-up of oil impacted sites in Ogoni, the Project Coordinator, Dr. Marvin Dekil has emphasized the need to stop the re-pollution of the environment.
Dekil made the case at an interactive session with the leadership of Ogoni Ex-Artesenal Refiners Forum in his office in Port-Harcourt.
He stated that apart from the huge economic loss on the country and its attendant damage to the environment, artesenal refining poses serious health hazards to those involved in the illegal act.
The HYPREP boss maintained that the federal government is serious about the cleanup of Ogoni land and so there is need for the group to reciprocate the gesture by ending the re-pollution of the environment.
Dekil stated that one of the key derivable of the clean-up project is the provision of alternative sources of livelihood for those whose original sources of income (farming and fishing) were affected by the oil pollution so that as the environment is being cleaned up, they can fend for themselves and their dependents.
He further urged the Ex-refiners to key into the project and not go back to illegal oil refining.
On his part, Chairman of the Ogoni Ex-Artesenal Refiners Forum, Cassidy Nbeera commended President Mohammadu Buhari for summoning the political will to make the Ogoni cleanup project a reality.
He pledged his group’s determination to stop all forms of illegal oil refining to see to the success of the Ogoni cleanup project.
Nbeera also promised the group’s willingness to join in the campaign to dissuade youths from further polluting the environment through a guided sensitization of Ogoni communities.
The Ex-refiners’ chairman urged the Federal Government to live up to its bidding of providing training for them to go into modular refining and listed other alternative sources of livelihood for them to include; Agro/Allied business, Waste Recycling, Basic Skills in Health, Safety and Environment Management (HSEM), Building, Fishing/Trawling, welding and fabrication.
