“Again…why have they allowed the Niger Delta to rot despite the region’s visible endurable major contribution to the fortune of the country? Why do the ‘rulers’ prefer short cut to issues of national question?” – Quoted in Nowinta’s book, 2009: Where We Are page (129)
Pebbles with Igbotako Nowinta.
Not quite long ago on this page I did an article titled: “The Tragedy of President Jonathan.”
In that piece I spared nothing in castigating ex-President Goodluck Jonathan for his sinful neglect of the Niger Delta.
I was angry and I showed it that by not doing anything tangible for the people of the Niger Delta, i.e. his brothers and sisters in the creeks, he was the greatest tragedy that befell the Niger Deltans in their contemporary history.
Specifically, I mentioned that the likes of late Ken Saro-Wiwa and fellow agitators who were mercilessly treated by General Sani Abacha’s kangaroo military tribunal and subsequently hanged because they dared to call for the human treatment of their ‘Ogoni kinsmen,‘ would be turning in their graves that their fellow brother betrayed their cause.
Indeed, for Goodluck Jonathan, it was a wonderful opportunity which he carelessly squandered, given the level of unprecedented degradation, heart wrenching wastages, appalling poverty, suffocating environmental pollution, human misery and sinful neglect of the area by successive Nigerian rulers.
Not too long ago, a talkative, busy body, insincere, but notoriously influential personality like Olusegun Obasanjo said that Goodluck Jonathan was a bad market that would haunt and hamper the fortunes of the South-South people for a long time to come.
I think Obasanjo has a point there, because the rare historic opportunity that was given to a Niger Deltan like Goodluck Jonathan will take the grace of the almighty to come by easily again politically.
Is it not really sad, that what Dr. Jonathan could not summon courage to do in six years to relieve his brothers and sisters bathing in the excruciating water of certain death occasioned by the dehumanizing level of oil spillage in Ogoni land, has taken a President Muhammadu Buhari less than three months to begin?
Nigerians would have been in a more terribly gigantic mess by now, if the Jonathans had not been sacked via the March 28th 2015 Presidential Election in Nigeria.
Everyone knows around the world that his legendary visionless, clueless, spineless and absolutely corrupt style of leadership that took us back as a nation cost him the presidency.
A visit to the Niger Delta will give us a more graphic situation of what years of crude oil exploration has done to the environment, especially in Ogoni land: the waters are desperately struggling with crude oil.
The lands are riddling with massive oil spillage; no clean water to drink; no good air to breathe in; vegetation is gradually being destroyed and wasted; diseases of various degrees arising from oil spillage are starring at the people unblinkingly.
Gas flaring is another sad constant reality; non-existent modern infrastructural facilities.
With poverty, penury, and hunger the living condition of the people is like hell on earth; worse than what is available to hopeless animals. This is the tragic reality, sentiments aside!
It is in this light that one will appreciate hugely the recent presidential order on the cleaning of the Ogoni land, part of the holistic agitations for which Ken Saro-Wiwa and company fought and were hanged in the Port Harcourt Prisons on November 10 1995.
Picking up the comprehensive recommendations of the United Nations Environmental Programmes (UNEP) Report on the Environmental Restoration of Ogoni land at this point in time has shown clearly that the Buhari presidency is ‘committed to working for the development and wellbeing of all Nigerians.’
Specifically, it is with genuine love for the Ogonis that this fantastic and proactive development is coming so early in the life of this administration in the midst of myriad of problems confronting the nation.
The presidential approval of the composition of the board and members of Hydrocarbon Pollution Restoration Project (HYPREP) and a contributory deposit of $10 million dollars which would be made by stakeholders within 30 days of the composition of the board of trustees mentioned above, shows that the gradual cleaning up of Ogoni land is a matter of time and reality in motion.
I wonder why Goodluck Jonathan could not summon courage to kick start this process? Probably, the Jonathans did not see any viable economic interest in that project for themselves?
With this show of concern from President Buhari, respected writer, activist and environmental campaigner, Ken Saro-Wiwa and fellow comrades can now rest totally in peace within the bowel of Port-Harcourt Cemetery.
Finally, I earnestly urge President Muhammadu Buhari to exercise his presidential weight to ensure the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) in the National Assembly in order for sanity, progress and accelerated development to
Prevail in the nation’s oil industry.
Without mincing words, with the PIB and the gradual reforms Dr. Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu is currently undertaking within the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), the nation’s economic, industrial, technological and financial prosperity will be on a fast lane.
Nowinta wrote Where We Are: A Call for Democratic Revolution in Nigeria.
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