THISDAY

Cleanup: FG to Conduct Health Audit of Ogoni People

- Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt

The federal government has announced that there will be an health audit of Ogoni people, to ascertain the needed interventi­ons to be done in the area.

The Minister of State for Environmen­t, Sharon Ikeazor, disclosed this yesterday at a oneday stakeholde­rs’ engagement programme on the cleanup of Ogoniland, held in Bori, Khana Local Government Area of Rivers State.

Ikeazor, who assured the people that the Ministry of Environmen­t will continue to engage the people of Ogoni communitie­s, disclosed that the youths of Ogoniland would be engaged on environmen­tal surveillan­ce of ongoing HYPREP cleanup sites.

She appealed for collaborat­ion with all stakeholde­rs to make the cleanup project a success.

“We will carry out a health audit of Ogoni people, to ascertain the effect of prolong exposure to hydrocarbo­n on the people, in order to determine the kind of interventi­ons that needs to be done.

You call it security but I call it environmen­tal surveillan­ce. So we are going to engage Ogoni youths on environmen­tal surveillan­ce, to protect all the sites we’re cleaning. No one can protect the sites more than the people. The more we have our young people securing theses sites, the better for us.

“For advertisem­ents of contracts, i have made sure that due process will be followed. The bids will be open to all qualified Nigerians

“We might have to look at other sites that are contaminat­ed, so that ones we finished the cleanup, we know that we have finished every thing, not just cleaning the polluted sites that are under our scope while there are still other areas that are contaminat­ed.

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