The All Progressives Congress (APC) Legacy Awareness and Campaign Group, a voluntary think-tank, has commended President Muhammadu Buhari over the landmark reforms in the Niger Delta.
Mr Tolu Ogunlesi, one of the leaders of the group, in a statement in Abuja, said that the reforms were aimed at maximising wealth to the benefits of the region.
The group also assured that President Buhari will not relent in the implementation of his vision of a safe, secure and prosperous Niger Delta despite his administration entering its final lap.
”The region though well endowed, before now, was left to the negative consequences of mineral exploitation, especially with regards to oil extractive activities by previous administrations.
”The narrative however changed as the Ogoni clean-up finally kicked off under Buhari`s watch.
“The procurement process for the clean-up commenced in 2018, while the actual remediation commenced in January 2019, with the handing over of the first batch of 21 sites to the selected contractors, for remediation.
“A second batch of sites was handed over in February 2020; 15 sites have now been fully cleaned, while work continues on others.
“In addition to the remediation, the clean-up project is also rehabilitating old water schemes and constructing new ones across Ogoniland,’’ he said.
Ogunlese noted that one of the first tasks in the clean-up was a water quality assessment in all four local governments that made up Ogoniland.
He said until 2016, there was only one functioning modular refinery in the Niger Delta, with a capacity to refine 1,000 barrels of crude oil per day.
He added that spurred by the Buhari administration’s new vision for the Niger Delta, there are now several modular refinery construction projects ongoing across the Niger Delta, all led by the private sector.
He noted that the Presidential Amnesty Programme, inherited from previous administrations, had continued to deliver on its mandate, with the full support of the president.
“The Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) is being reformed and repositioned, in line with the president’s vision of ensuring that the people of the Niger Delta benefit maximally from the wealth of their land.
“The administration has recently completed and commissioned the commission’s headquarters, 25 years after construction began, and after several spells of abandonment by previous governments.
“After close to two decades of false starts, the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) has seen the light of day, with the signing into law of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) by Buhari on Aug. 16,’’ Ogunlesi said.
He said this was yet another jinx broken by Buhari, adding that the PIA would make available an estimated 500 million dollars annually for host communities to deploy for developmental projects.
He added that this was unprecedented in the country`s history because there had never been any dedicated fund to serve host communities.
According to him, another jinx broken is the inability to carry out a bid round for marginal oil fields since 2003.
“This year the Department of Petroleum Resources concluded the first such bid round in 18 years, with an estimated value of around half a billion dollars in expected revenues for the government.
“This is in addition to billions of dollars that will be invested in the purchased assets and host communities.
“Even as his administration enters its final lap, President Buhari will not relent in the implementation of his vision of a safe, secure and prosperous Niger Delta,’’ Ogunlesi stressed.