Civil Society Coalition for Ogoni clean up has accused the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Programme (HYPREP) of abandoning the Ogoni clean-up in favour of organizing expensive stakeholders meetings in hotels in Abuja and Port Harcourt.
The group in a press briefing by its chairman, Young Kigbara, also condemned the federal government and its partner, SHELL, for their lackadaisical implementation of the UNEP report, which recommended a total clean-up of Ogoniland polluted by oil exploration.
CISOC is apalled by the dangerous revelations by UNEP that Ogoni people were breathing air in an environmentally polluted atmosphere, saying the Federal Government and HYPREP do not care as they had treated the implementation of the emergency measures, UNEP recommended with levity and no sense of urgency.
The coalition said it was worried that since 2016 the Federal Government assured that the actual implementation of the clean-up had started, very little had been achieved, stressing that the emergency measures which ought to have been implemented was abandoned by HYPREP.
It said the federal government and HYPREP do not seem to appreciate the enormous danger, which the entire Ogoni face, as they daily eat food and drink water containing carcinogens.
The body equally condemned the method of disposing collected contaminated soil in polythene bags and dumping same at close vicinity, stressing that the process does not promote environmentally sound practice.
CISOC, while pilloring what it called the superfluous delay in the release of funds for the quick implementation of the clean-up exercise, called on the authorities concerned to immediately start building the necessary facilities and institutions as recommended in the report.
While appealing to the international community and well-meaning Nigerians to prevail on the government to treat the Ogoni clean-up exercise seriously, the Civil Society Organization, called for the questioning of seriousness and integrity of the process as well as demonstration of high sense of accountability in the use of public funds at its disposal.
