Body tasks FG to compel oil companies on clean up spillages
Titus Akhigbe, Benin
Environmental Right Action and Friends of the Earth, Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) have called on the federal government to compel oil companies to embark on the cleanup of decades of pollution of the environment in the Niger Delta region within the next one year.
Executive Director, ERA/FoEN, Dr. Godwin Uyi Ojo, in a media briefing in Benin, noted that the persistent environmental degradation in the Niger Delta region by multinational oil companies and their failure to conduct clean up and remediation for livelihoods and environmental protection is an unpardonable crime against humanity.
This policy brief according to Uyi Ojo looks at the oil companies’ double standards in the management of environmental problems arising from oil operations in the Niger Delta.
“Despite on-going petroleum sector reforms, the oil sector has lacked transparency and remains mainly characterized by massive environmental degradation and human rights violations.
“Shell, Chevron, Total, ENI/Agip, as well as several other multinational and local oil companies have been implicated because together they have contributed immensely to the destruction of the environment in the region and caused severe impact on the livelihoods and violent conflicts that have further impoverished community people,” he said.
In view of the above observations, Uyi Ojo said the federal government needs to rise up to its responsibilities by holding the multinational companies accountable in the oil sector management to ensure that they end gas flaring, halt frequent oil spills and ensure real time surveillance of crude oil pipelines to detect spills and cases of vandalism.
He urged the government to put in place a contingency plan of action for the total clean up and restoration of the entire Niger Delta region which would require an initial take off grant of US$100 billion to be set aside for the exercise to complement the Ogoni cleanup process.
He also recommended “that the federal government should divest investment from fossils to put an end to oil prospecting and embrace renewable energy transition to eliminate the severe impact of oil operations on communities and the environment.
“That the federal government should urgently put in place a national environmental action plan to set environmental sustainability targets and monitor the rate of progress in the environmental protection.
“And that Shell has a responsibility to insist on standards obtainable in OECD countries in the management of oil spills and gas flaring in Nigeria as well as halting the gas pipelines it is laying in proximity to residential and business areas in Joinkrama community and conduct the mandatory environmental impact assessment for the gas project.”
