The apex youth body in Ogoni, the National Youth Council of Ogoni People (NYCOP), has debunked claims that the recent blow out of some pipelines belonging to the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), was an act of sabotage by Ogoni youths.
President of NYCOP, Dr Young Nkpah, said the incident was as a result of wornout facilities.
Speaking with The Tide in an exclusive interview in Port Harcourt at the weekend, the NYCOP president pointed out that the affected pipeline was layed as far back as 1958. He noted that the facilities were already obsolete which led to the blow out.
He said blaming the blow out on alledged sabotage by Ogoni youth was “a monumental distraction on the part of NNPC” and urged the federal government to critically address the Ogoni issues on its merits, without resorting to distractions and the blame game.
On the current laying of pipes by the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) in Ogoni, the NYCOP president described the process as a “misnomer”.
He said, “it beats human imagination that a company that has long divested from Ogoni land, stopped on-shore oil exploration and is assumed that there is no oil production in Ogoni from 1993 till date, will be laying new pipes in the area, the question is, what is the relevance of laying pipes in Ogoni now, with huge military presence? NYCOP feels they are testing the waters”.
He decried the hypocritical approach and lip service being paid to addressing the Ogoni issue, noting that NYCOP will mobilise its rank and file to resist any move by SPDC or the Federal Government to commence oil production in Ogoni , without addressing the issues at stake, which border on social injustice perpetrated against Ogoni people.
He accused the Federal Government of playing politics with the restoration and total remediation of Ogoni land and stated that, “the accelerated passage of the North East Development Commission Bill before the National Assembly was a clear indication of disservice to the Ogoni issue, which has lingered on for decades”.
Nkpah faulted the operations of HYPREP in Ogoni land, stating that the operations of the federal agency was lacking in consultation and clear cut criteria. “HYPREP said it was presently embarking on training of personels and building of internal processes, what are the criteria used for selecting the people to be trained? Who is involved in the training, and what are the internal processes being put in peace.
The NYCOP president further stated that “any prospecting oil company in Ogoni must adhere strictly to international best practices, you cannot sit in Abuja and allocated OML II to anybody without due consultation with critical stakeholders”.
On the way forward, he said the Ogoni Development Fund (ODF) was premised on the impetration of justice, noting that, “the good development of sustainable economic growth in Ogoni and Rivers State are both desirable, realistic and achievable, gives the proper  understanding of the undercurrent which we have problematized in the Ogoni Bill of Rights”.
It could be recalled that the authorities of NNPC had alleged sabotage on the part of Ogoni youth in the recent blowout of its pipeline faciltieis in Ogoni laud.

Taneh Beemene