Hessington Okolo, a lawyer by training and President, National Association of Ndokwa Youth Congress, the umbrella youth organisation for Ndokwa people, the second largest ethnic group in Delta State, in this interview with JULIET ALOHAN, narrates the ordeal facing his people as a result of the activities of Agip, a major multinational oil company operating in the area. Excerpts
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Tell us about your challenges?
Severally we have tried to let the world know of the problems bedeviling the Ndokwa people, which is an oil and gas producing community with the largest proven gas reserve? in West Africa, it has over 2 billion reserve of crude oil. But it is unfortunate that we have not benefited from this huge wealth placed in Ndokwa land. In terms of infrastructure we have had nothing and in terms of employment, we have lagged behind. Agip which is the major multinational operating in the area since 1957 has done nothing to benefit the people, meanwhile, over 9million barrels of crude leave our soil yearly according to official reports.
What are the major issues?
Because of the power situation in the country, Agip built an independent Power Plant (IPP), a huge investment which currently generates 458MW of? power for the country and the power was stepped down in Obosi, Anambra State, while the Ndokwa people live in darkness. Meanwhile, the Environmental Impact Assesment (EIA), which was done by Agip recommended a step down of power from the IPP to communities within 5o kilometers radius of the plant, which could ordinarily cover the entire Ndokwa region, but they failed to do so because they felt they have the power of coercion. Since 2005 when the then President Olushegun Obasanjo came to commission the project, we have demanded to know why such a massive project would be built on our land and we don’t benefit from it.
What efforts have you made to reach Agip?
We have directed our petitions to Agip. In fact a letter was written to Agip’s headquarters in Italy, and we copied Agip Nigeria, but instead of looking at the content of our request, Agip went to the government alleging that we were militants who wanted to blow up oil facilities, and military personnel were quickly sent in to cow us. It was this kind of oppression and suppression that gave rise to militant struggle in the Niger Delta, because for every time a genuine agitation was suppressed, the next generation of agitators would be more violent. We are only asking for what is right, our people are traditionally farmers and fishermen. Now our farm lands have been taken and the rivers are polluted, we have no means of livelihood anymore, and they have also failed to provide an alternative to our traditional means of livelihood, leaving us with nothing. We have no quarrel with the IPP being built on our land, but they have taken? the land to step down power and even recommended to themselves in the EIA report to step it down to boost the economy of the area, but failed to do so because they believe they can give arms to the soldiers to cow us if we complained.
Have you? directed your complaints to government?
We have written to the presidency, and the late President Yar’Adua directed the then minister of petroleum, Odein Ajumogobia, to look at the issue, unfortunately he passed away after then and there was never a follow up. We thought that government is a continuation and expected that all the correspondences should be somewhere. But nothing has come from the presidency thereafter.
What attempts have you made to direct the matter to the Niger Delta Ministry?
What authority does the ministry have in a matter that has been presented before the presidency? The Niger Delta as a region has a lot of challenges and the ministry has done little or nothing to solve them.? They gave amnesty in 2009 as a step to development, but amnesty to me is just a means to buy time. They are giving training to 26,000 people, of that number, how many of them are going to be employed at the end of the day? We expected that by now there should be massive construction and development going on in the area, but there is nothing. The oil industry is very technical; there is less human workforce, so I laugh when they say they are going to absorb them. We have petroleum engineers, industrial welders, geologists and others with masters’ degrees hanging around because they could not? get jobs.
Are you saying the amnesty is? a sham?
No. That’s not what am saying, the original intention was good. But you need to build roads, bridges and start massive construction of infrastructure in the region. Where are the schools, the hospitals and power they promised us? They need to tackle the issue from the root which I think they are not doing. We are going into the third year now and all they have done is train some youths and pay them some small money. The problem is that there are no jobs, if these people had jobs, they won’t bother with government’s training because they would be able to train themselves. The amnesty has given government time, but they have not utilised it very well.
What specifically are you asking of Agip, and government on the other hand?
We have told Agip to step down? power for Ndokwa people from the IPP, but they kept saying they could not step down. But recently they came up with a divide and rule tactics, and promised to step down for Okpai, where the IPP is located, as well as Beneku, and Abor kingdom. This indicates that they have the capacity to step it down all these years. We are also aware that the power generated there is being sold to PHCN. Our investigations at the PHCN showed that there is need for collaboration between Agip and government for power to be stepped down. Do we have to agitate for what is supposed to be rightfully ours? If you go to Okpai where the IPP was stepped down, a whole street including their market has fallen into the River, because Agip dredged sand from River Niger to sand-fill the IPP site without any erosion control at the river bank. There is also the need for less than a kilometer bridge to connect Okpai and Kwale, and Agip has given various reasons why it would not do it.
As a people we have done our best to let our voices be heard. We have worked with environmental rights organisations, who came all the way from Bulgaria to see for themselves and they wept for us. Another issue is that Agip claimed to have stopped gas flaring in Ndokwa land, in fact, the chief executive officer of Eni, which is the parent body of Agip, stated at their last stakeholders meeting that by June this year there would be an end to gas flaring in Ndokwa land because of the IPP. But when the environmental rights group came they saw seven flare sites in Okpai alone. Meanwhile, Agip is benefiting from carbon credit, because it is claiming to have stopped gas flare in Ndokwa. We hope that Agip and the federal government would listen to us this time. We have challenged Agip severally to make public what they have done for our people and they have never responded because they have nothing to show.