By Nneka Nwogwugwu
The directive by President Muhammadu Buhari to audit and reorganise the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) has been greatly welcomed by the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP).
President Buhari had in a memo dated July 29, 2022 ordered an audit of HYPREP from its inception and approved its reorganization while the agency remains under the management of the Ministry of Environment.
Reacting to this, Fegalo Nsuke, President of MOSOP, welcomed the development, saying that the audit will expose massive fraud, which he said has been ongoing in the agency.
Speaking to Journalists in Port Harcourt, Nsuke, said that it was awkward to move the supervision of an environmental cleanup exercise from a ministry of environment to a ministry designed to purposely gratify the Niger Delta people.
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Dismissing the argument that the Ogoni Cleanup is a Niger Delta affair, Nsuke said the entire world has shown more commitment to the Ogoni cause and cleanup program than the Niger Delta ministry.
He said if the argument of the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs were to be taken seriously, then all the road works, healthcare interventions, educational institutions and all federal government intervention in the Niger Delta should have been routed through the Niger Delta Ministry.
The MOSOP President considered the Niger Delta ministry’s attempted incursion into the Ogoni cleanup exercise as a crooked target at the cleanup funds.
“We are aware of some clandestine moves targeting the Ogoni cleanup funds and to get recommendation for an oil firm to resume oil production in Ogoni through some impostors who claim to be representing the Ogoni people,” he said.
He advised the leadership of the Niger Delta Ministry to take its eyes from the Ogoni cleanup funds and not contemplate any possibility whatsoever that some Niger Delta nationalities will use impostors to control the Ogoni cleanup by any means.
