Engineer Andrew Ojogbo is the Director of Environmental Management in the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs, saddled with the task of linking the once neglected region to the national grid. In this interview with CHRISTIANA ESEBONU, he speaks on how the dwindling budgetary allocation to the ministry has hampered the ministry's effort to remedy? the region's oil-impacted environment.
How far has this department gone since the inception of the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs?
We are all aware of how the ministry came into being, and we believe that the problem of the Niger Delta has basically been the source of the environmental problems in the region.
As we all know, this environmental pollution, prior to the creation of our ministry, affected the area badly to the extent that the people lost confidence in government’s commitment to remediating their land, and, thus, redeem their poverty aggravated status.?
The Department of Environmental Management is a key player in the ministry. We have, in a bid to foster results in our mandates, come up with result-oriented vision and missions, aimed at ensuring that the environment is not only cleaned up but sustained.
Our mission is not only to restore but to protect the environment through restoring the damage the area has recorded over the years, and also ensuring that the environment is adequately conserved. To achieve this, we have basically four divisions: Natural Resources Management; that’s where we get consistent restoration and control impact.
We also have the Shoreline Pro tection and Land Reclamation Division, charged with the daunting role of remediating oil-impacted sites.?
We also have the Environmental Planning and Assessment Division where we are futuristic in thinking about what the environment should be like in the? next couple of years, and, in retrospect, we? try to re-impact on projects that are already going on.
In recent years, we have studied about 33 sites so far, except in Ogoni land where the ministry deliberately didn?t get into due to some issues. We have 33 very highly impacted sites.
We have started remediating one site and contractors are in the site presently. We have almost completed procurement of heavily polluted sites but due to financial constraints, we have not started work on those new procurements.
In the east-west zone, the impact of? integration management is on-going and the consultant has highlighted areas where impact of the ongoing road construction project would? be migrated to. We hope to do more impact migration exercises on our ongoing projects in 2012.
Recently, the minister insisted we pay a visit to oil-impacted areas (oil? spills) and there are three areas affected, one at Nembe, one at Forcadoes, and a major one in Bonga. In the course of this visits, the ministry got to know the efforts put in by Shell to remediate the affected sites.
May I state here that as an interventionist ministry, we have always been in touch with the regulatory body, particularly NESREA (Nigeria Environmental Standards Regulatory Agency) , a relationship that gave us access to a comprehensive list? of these impacted sites. Surprisingly, Most of the sites we found? on paper were originally not on the list of polluted sites or areas.?
NESREA has taken samples of what the conditions on those sites and have even accessed relevant information? of results of the samples taken, though the outcome is not yet fully complete as it has not reached the stage where NESREA can give us information. So, as at last week, we visited NESREA in order to ascertain the situation, and, based on our findings, our ministry plans to actually visit these communities.
You mentioned that you have 33 highly impacted sites. Are they in one location? How is the spread? So far, how many of these sites have been taken care of and how do you intend to complete such?
When the ministry was created, we all knew that there were lot of oil- impacted sites in the Niger Delta region which were well documented even though there have been recent spills. The ministry looked at 11 of those sites and commissioned consultants to go and do a complete study with the aim to embark on remediation.
The results that came showed that within one site, you may have four to five impacted sites. For instance, they may be reports that Abuja is impacted and one may come to Abuja but discover that areas like Wuse 2, Gwarimpa, Maitaima,? among other areas in Abuja, were impacted. In cases like this, you start treating these discovered sites in Abuja as different projects and, today, we have studied 33 of such sites.
After studies, we found out that what we needed at that time (in 2009-2010) was about N50bn to remediate? these 33 sites. But by present-day cost, we are talking about N70-75bn to do that. We can only do what the budget can handle.
So, we started off immediately in 2010 to see if we could handle about threeto five sites. The fund could only allow us to take on one – that is the one at Stubbs Creek in Eket LGA. That one is presently on-going.
The project would have gone relatively far but for some communal problems which the minister sorted out with the governor a couple of months ago and the contractor is going back to site again.
The rest, as I said earlier, have only done all the procurement process but no funds to commence them. There are four of such presently that we are looking at, but when you look at the ministry’s budget, even if its just remediation we want to do, the ministry’s budget cannot do that. So, we just take on whatever we can execute with available resources.
What are your goals in 2012 ?
In 2012, we just want to be able to continue with the one at Stubbs Creek and possibly complete it. There are no new ones but the ministry is also trying to source for funds outside the budgetary process, because we have come to know that we cannot develop or remediate the problems in the Niger Delta from budgetary allocation. So the ministry is looking out for funds from donor agencies.
This N75bn you are talking about, does it include compensation? Who takes care of compensation in highly impacted areas and those affected by the construction of the East-West Road?
Compensation for roads, yes, the ministry is taking care of that and my colleague manning the Department of Infrastructure is on that and the ministry is paying compensation.
The impact mitigation exercise which we did from this department indicated that the communities are happy with the compensation being done by the ministry, because part of the impact mitigation organic project is that we trying to find out how the communities ars receiving the project and whether the contractors met the conditions of taking their right of way to construct the road.
And, so far, the reports are coming out very fine. No community is complaining about not getting its compensation except for Eket where they wanted the road to pass through the town, but the impact mitigation recommended a by-pass and the minister has been to Akwa Ibom State to address the issue and I think the community is accepting the proposal.
With the paucity of funds, what happens to the other 32 sites? Is your ministry doing anything to cushion the effects of their suffering in the interim?
The problem with pollution goes a long way as some of them have taken place over 20 years. The ministry is just trying to see what it can do and the position goes beyond the 33 sites identified in the Niger Delta.
Owing to paucity of funds, there is really little the ministry can do regarding this, and, like I said earlier, we are looking for funds elsewhere through bilateral discussions, through banks like urban development banks, on some of these issues, like UNDP which? is working on a framework for us.
Again, my colleague in Policy and Research Department will talk more about this, because it is his department that is handling that.
We are looking for funds, like I said. Where you are looking for N75 billion and you have a budget of N50billion, the East-West Road alone will gulp all of that. The kind of budget that comes to this department alone can really do very little.
Remember, our projects are not quick-fix projects and if I were to request funds to execute my projects, to touch the communities more positively and effectively in 2012, I will be asking from this department alone from the Federal Government over N140bn to execute the projects we have planned for.
But I think, in 2012, all we are going to get is just about N5.7bn and that is why we just stuck to one project, to see how far we can go in completing that.
Bear in mind its just limited to impacted sites.Communities are being washed away by erosion, by shorelines; agricultural lands are being taken away, and all these are to be accommodated within an envelope of? N5bn!
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Having been able to take on the problem of just one community, Eket to be precise, in the last two years, how many more impacted sites do you think you can pick up in the near future?
Again, it depends on how much funds we get and if our attempts at sourcing funds from within and outside Nigeria yield results. This is because many people actually want to do things on the environment, but the basic thing is that they want guarantee from government and we are working on that.
If we get funds, I will be looking for about N140.5billion just for the environment. We are talking about shoreline protection, eco-system conservation.
This is because most of the eco-system of the region has been damaged. Water hyacinth is a problem in that area. We have no funds with which we can execute this programmes.
Apart from the work that is ongoing in Eket, what are some of the other sites?
Yes, I can actually give you quite a number of sites, for impacted sites as I stated earlier, we have studied the 33 sites discovered and? earmarked, but we are presently working at the one located in Eket, Akwa Ibom State, and to give you an insight, where we have even gone as far as completing all the procurements process with Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP)? but cannot proceed due to lack of funds.
These include a project at Teyidaba in Bayelsa State, an heavily impacted site; one in Delta State, Ekapamre, another at? Escravos in Delta? State; those are the ones we focused on in 2010 which were latter hampered by poor funding.
Looking at the obstacles, do you think these problems would be taken care of in 20-50 years?
Where there is a will, there is a way, and as this ministry has that will, that is why we have resolved to seek aid outside. I will not be in a position to mention them now because they have not come up openly.
We are talking to other governments who have showed interest in the Niger Delta. With these efforts, I believe we'll soon start getting enough funds to work in the region.
Meanwhile, I want you to know that the environmental remediation projects are in the form of land reclamation and shoreline protection, which we have already kick-started in Ogbobagbane, Delta State, and erosion control in Igbontor-Igbake as well as Oyomo/Okhelen Awe Road in Uromi, Edo State; canalisation of Bateren Tselu-Utanoyibo Creek in Warri, canalisation of Odoubou-Boloutou Creek; same with Ogbobagbene and Foupolo-Bulou Creek in Burutu; erosion control work in Ogudu Community of Abia State, Ikuru Commlmity of Rivers, Ibout-Utan and Effiat communities, Ibankang Nssit-Ekot, Ekpo-Unyehe roads in Akwa Ibom and Essein Ekorimin community in Cross River State.
The highlight? of my ministry’s achievement? include 71 per cent completion of?? reclamation/ shoreline protection project at Kurutie, Gbaramatu clan, Warri South LGA, Delta State; 50 per cent completion of? Idumuje-Unor Erosion Control Project, Delta State; 72 per cent completion of land reclamation/ erosion control at Igbonto- Igbanke and Oyo/Okhelen-Awo Road, Uromi, Edo State.
Others are 48 per cent completion of land reclamation/erosion control at Ibakang Nssit –Ikot Ekpo, Unyene road, Nsit Atai LGA, Akwa Ibom State and 20 per cent remediation and restoration of oil-impacted site at Stubbs Creek, Eket, Akwa Ibom State, among others. In fact, with this level of work done, if the fund is made available, then it will not take up to 20 years to develop the region.?
Apart shoreline protection, what other area does your department look into?
Apart from shore protection, this department, in the area of transportation, does canalization. We try to ensure that the natural paths created by God in the region is available, since most of the communities cannot access each other, knowing that it is going to take a lot of money to construct roads for them.
We have about five communities we are canalizing now, while three are at consultancy stage, three are others were awarded late last year, and contractors have long moved to the sites.
How much fund is needed to give the Niger Delta environment a facelift?
I don’t think I should be calling this figure for because it would be scary. Ernestly, I have made a projection and I know that I'm just trying to be modest by asking for the N140.5billion to enable me do something tangible, but where out of it you are just given maybe N5-N6billion, you find out that you can only do little.