UNEP team promise timely clean-up of Ogoni land, to recruit indigenes as staff

The Technical Team of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has promised to execute and complete the cleaning of the impacted sites in Ogoniland in a timely and prompt manner.

The team led by the Director of the African Regional Office of UNEP, Mr.Mounkaila Goumandakoye gave the assurance in Abuja yesterday when it met with the members of the Presidential Implementation Committee on the Clean-Up Ogoni project.

According to Mr. Goumandakoye, “UNEP is making sure that everything that would be required to do the project is in place.

“Since the financial resources are in place, we are making sure that the scientific and technical team is in place. We are determined to make sure the project is implemented in a timely manner”

He added that UNEP would recruit indigenes of the area as part of its core staff in order to facilitate good understanding of the project among the communities. “ We are going to pay attention to the local people. We are recruiting the local people as part of our staff in the liaison offices by the end of second quarters.”

The UNEP team leader pointed out that UNEP was in the country for the project on the invitation of the Federal Government so that the organization can provide un-biased clean-up and remediation service to the people of Ogoniland whose land had been polluted over the years as a result of oil spill.

Not less than 300 sites had been identified as having been impacted by oil spill as at 2007 but the present UNEP team stated that a review of the sites would be carried out again as new ones might have arisen.

Addressing the team, the Minister of Environment, Mr John Odey pointed out that Mr. President was very keen about the execution of the project and that the people of the area were also looking on to UNEP to get their land cleaned.

The Chair of the Presidential Implementation Committee, Rev. Father Mathew Kukah described the project as a good one and urged UNEP to feel free to talk with anybody and interact with the local people.

The Minister assured that the Federal Government would support UNEP with every requirement to make the project a success.

“Ordinary people in Ogoni land are interested in getting this resolved”

Meanwhile, the Minister of Environment, John Odey, has assured the people of Anambra State of Federal Government intervention to tackle the erosion problems in the state.

The Minister gave the assurance in Abuja yesterday when he met with the State Governor Peter Obi in his office.

The meeting was a follow-up discussion on the directive of Mr President, Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar Adua to do baseline study of the erosion problems in the states.

According to the Minister, the report of the baseline study is ready and there is a need to follow-up on how we can do some remediation on the affected areas. We want to see how we can fast-track this.

Governor Obi stated that his visit to the Minister was to further elucidate on the particular and peculiar problem of erosion in Anambra State.

He noted that the State is the most erosion ravaged state in the country and that the State Government would need the collaboration with the Federal Government to tackle the problem.