Ogoni Clean-Up: Youths Want Probe Of HYPREP’s Expenses

A group known as Ogoni Youth Federation has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to direct the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC) to commence investigation into the alleged massive financial fraud and corruption going on in the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP).
The Ogoni youth reaction followed the revelation by the Chief Operating Officer for Downstream, Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mr. Roland Ewubare, at the House of Representatives Committee on Environment meeting held at National Assembly Complex, last week.
The NNPC official said that Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) and its Joint Ventures Partners, had paid the HYPREP a total of US$360,000,000 which is equivalent to One Hundred and Twenty-Nine Billion, Six Hundred Million Naira.
The youths, in a press statement signed by its National Coordinator, Comrade Legborsi Yaamabana, said, “We reiterate our warning to NNPC and its JV partners not to release further funds meant for the implementation of the Ogoni environmental clean-up project to the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP), until proper account has been made over US$360,000,000 received thus far.
“It is unfathomable that with US$360,000,000 (N129,600,000,000 billion) in the kitty of HYPREP already, Ogoni communities are still condemned to drinking, cooking, bathing and fishing in heavily contaminated water with benzene and other carcinogenic materials in concentration over 900 times above the acceptable maximum as stipulated in the WHO guidelines. The reality of the Ogoni clean-up is that there are more lies than truth surrounding the exercise”.