Osinbajo Meets Niger Delta Leaders Over Renewed Threats

Elder statesman and leader of PANDEF, Clarke, who addressed state House Correspondents at the end of the meeting described it as very fruitful and called on the people of the region to maintain peace and await the implementation of the FG’s vision.
“The message is that everyone should maintain peace,’’ Clarke said adding that the group had seen the commitment of the federal government to pursue its development agenda in the region.

“The meeting was excellent. We met with Mr Acting President and he was very honest, truthful, forthright and we were very satisfied.”
Clark denied an ultimatum was issued to the federal government on the vision’s implementation but added that the parties agreed on many things with PANDEF and the ministers presenting their separate addresses and Osinbajo rounding off.
“We saw his genuineness, truthfulness, forthrightness; he is a gentleman and we support him and we are satisfied,” he said.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that as the meeting was on the Acting Presidential Spokesman, Laolu Akande, released a fact sheet on the vision showing that the FG had set aside an initial one billion dollars for the clean-up and environmental remediation of Ogoniland.

According to the fact sheet, 200 million dollars will be disbursed yearly for the first five years and work on the project will be conducted in line with international best practices.

Akande stated that already soil and water tests had been done in preparation for the clean-up and 15 technical assistants from Ogoniland hired to be part of the work.

He said that to drive infrastructure, the FG has released funds for the continuation of various sections of the East-West Road adding that as at March 2017, the overall project completion was substantial with some sections reaching 99 per cent completion.

Akande stated that the FG had plans to construct health centres in the states and communities of the region which on completion would be fully equipped to address some of the health needs of rural dwellers.

He added that FG had started the process of replacing illegal refineries in the region with modular ones, including options on how to involve the communities as shareholders in the proposed Modular Refineries.

He said that the ground-breaking of the first set of such refineries were expected in the 4th quarter of 2017 and the government would supply crude to the local refineries at reasonable price.

Akande stated that the measure was to serve as an incentive to stop the current practice whereby illegal refiners vandalised and stole the crude adding that each Niger Delta state was expected to host two modular refineries.