Shell’s ORP takes anti-bunkering campaign to Ogoni communities

Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) has returned to the interior areas of Ogoni ethnic communities with a campaign against oil theft and illegal refining, saying this was causing mass death and destruction of the environment.

This is as chiefs and elders in the battle-weary Ogoni land have pleaded for a speedy resolution of the dispute that led to the exit of Shell in 1993, to allow oil activities to return to the area.

SPDC had established what it called Ogoni Restoration Project (ORP) to begin the implementation of the 22 tasks assigned to the oil operator by the UNEP Report on Ogoni environment, which was submitted to the Federal Government in 2012.

ORP, which counts several successes in the task of interfacing with the Ogoni communities, said its activities had led to a toning down of the hostility to SPDC by the Ogoni communities to the extent that Shell was now allowed easier access to spill sites. ORT said it had also launched livelihood enhancing projects and awreness campaigns in the area, saying the team remediated 91 sites along the SPDC Right of Way (RoW).

The team stormed Kpite, a town in Tai Local Council area, on Wednesday, July 15, 2015, to mobilise against oil theft and refining. A top official of the ORP, Hope Nuka, who introduced the essence of the visit at the palace of the Tua-Tua Tai, the Mene, Samuel Nne, that the team was in Kpite on awareness campaigns as part of the UNEP Report outcome.

He emptied his message to the elder on the dangers of oil theft and refining, thus: “The danger is worse than the oil spill our people are fighting against. The economy of Nigeria is being affected by this scenario. The pains of the activity are more than the gains: the pain is for all but the gain is for an individual. Often, the people die in the process of stealing or heating the oil.”

The royal father, with huge applause from the elders, urged the Federal Government and SPDC to act faster in resolving the long-lasting dispute to allow oil exploration activities in Ogoni, saying the youths had resorted to violent lifestyles to feed.

“We have been harping on this to our youths because of the dangers to all of us. It is good that Shell and the government came to lend weight to our efforts. As leaders here, we continue to drive the message home; that those doing it are nothing but local thieves, and that it takes their lives,” according to the royal father.

He recalled his days as a young boy when he earned income working for Shell, and said the youths of today were eager to also taste such life, saying “we are looking forward to return of oil exploration in Ogoni because wealth cannot be created if not by exploiting what God put in your soil.”

The leader of the team from the Rivers State Ministry of Environment, Charles George, said it was time for change, and urged the people to expect big news in one month time, especially an appointment to the Ogoni in agency charged with implementation of the UNEP Report. He urged the youths to learn skills that would soon be required in the much-expected clean-up exercise.

In his comments, the leader of the Federal Ministry of Environment team, Augustine Belloe (a senior environment officer), warned of harsh jail terms now awaiting oil thieves, and also warned against encroachment on Right of Way, as “the worst is that the money they make on this dangerous crime is wasted on lifestyle.”

The spokesperson of the community, Mission Pinwa, regretted that despite the dangers, some youths still saw nothing bad in oil bunkering, and called on his people to stop the act.

Lending his weight to the call, the president of Kpite Youth Association, Bob-Two Nkuekue, assured that nobody would tamper with pipelines in Tai. He however appealed for jobs for the youths and loans to the women as a form of empowerment to encourage the Kpite people.

The manager, SPDC’s Ogoni Restoration Project, Augustine Igbuku commented: “The campaign has gone on very well with crowds turning up to hear messages on the need to stop crude theft. As part of efforts to encourage gainful employment among youths, we have designed some alternative livelihood programmes such as the Ogoni LiveWire which in February graduated 105 Ogoni youths in different skills after a thre month intensive skills and business enterprise management training and offered them start-up funds and support. We hope that the twin approach will help drive down crude theft and artisanal oil activities in Ogoni land.”