Mkpoikana Udoma
06 January 2018, Sweetcrude, Port Harcourt — A group known as Ogoni Youth Federation, OYF, has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to urgently sack the Coordinator of the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project, HYPREP, Dr. Marvin Dekil, over alleged highhandedness and incompetence.
The group also accused the Coordinator of HYPREP of being secretive in his activities, claiming that the youths of Ogoni have lost confidence in him.
A statement by the Public Relations Officer of the group, Mr. Kingsley Lekue, condemned an alleged attack on the President of OYF, Mr. Legborsi Yamaabana, by security operatives on the alleged orders of Dr. Marvin Dekil.
The statement alleged the assaulted President had gone with some members of the group to Hotel Presidential, venue of a programme organized by HYPREP for Ogoni stakeholders, but was barred from entering, and brutally assaulted by security operatives.
The group accused Dr. Marvin Dekil of slighting the Ogoni youths and other key stakeholders in his activities, and called on the Presidency to relieve him of his position on the ground of “culpable incompetence.”
Meanwhile, the Coordinator of the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project, Dr. Marvin Dekil, says the body has never sidelined any Ogoni person from participating in the process of the clean-up of Ogoniland.
Dekil speaking on a live radio programme monitored in Port Harcourt, said the structure of the project is such that it incorporates everybody including the youths. He stated that the cleanup Board of Trustees has KAGOTE, and MOSOP in the Governing Council, which are the umbrella socio-cultural pressure groups and mouthpiece of Ogoniland.
The Coordinator further said that those making allegations of HYPREP sidelining the youths do so because they have a misconception about the Ogoni clean-up project, thinking that the project is about sharing money.
According to him, “MOSOP is the body representing Ogoni. MOSOP cuts across every class including Ogoni professionals, youths, elders, and everybody. So when someone says the youths are not being carried along whereas MOSOP is seated in the governing council, it means that there is a disconnect in terms of information between that person and the actual sense of the project.
“People have to understand that we are not going to look for individuals who think they are the youth leaders, but we are looking at the body that represents everybody and that body is MOSOP and KAGOTE.
“If any person has a dissenting voice, as to the authority of MOSOP and KAGOTE in Ogoniland, he should state his case and that will be looked at differently, but so far the template as developed by the Federal Government is to discuss and use these people as representatives of Ogoni people and that’s the way we are going,” Dr. Dekil said.
