Mkpoikana Udoma 16 December 2014, Sweetcrude, Port Harcourt – An environmental rights group, the Ken Saro-Wiwa Associates, has called on the people of Rivers State, particularly the Ogoni ethnic group, to support the Federal Government in the implementation of the environmental assessment report recommended by the United Nations Environmental Programme, UNEP.
The group stated this at a press briefing in Port Harcourt.
National Coordinator of the group, Chief Gani Topba, said the group was against any act capable of truncating the agreement between the Federal Government and the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People, MOSOP – the apex decision-making body in Ogoniland – on the implementation of the report.
Chief Topba said this is also part of the four-point communiqué issued by his group at the end of its 2014 congress, as he pleaded that all hands must be on deck for the effective and successful implementation of the UNEP Reports by the Federal Government.
According to him, “It is not time to drag politics into the implementation of the UNEP reports. The Federal Government, through the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke, has shown that it can clean-up Ogoni environment. They should be supported because the government is addressing the issue that affects the poor in Ogoniland”.
“We resolved to fully and wholeheartedly support the Federal Ministry of Petroleum Resources-led remedial intervention aimed at restoring the Ogoni environment”.
“We have further noted that all the steps adopted so far in this direction, are fully in compliance with the agreements reached on August 8, 2014, between the Federal Government and the people of Ogoni led by MOSOP”, he added.
Topba also appealed to politicians in Ogoni, regardless of political affiliations to support the government in the restoration of the Ogoni environment.
