Conflict looms over Ogoni cleanup delay

• As Group Remembers Slain Activist
The Ogonis have warned that delay in the clean up of their environment 25 months after President Muhammadu Buhari flagged off the exercise might trigger unrest.

Speaking at the 23rd anniversary of the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa and other Ogoni eight martyrs, they demand that Federal Government clears their names of murder.

President, Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), Legborsi Saro Pyagbara lamented the ongoing environmental terrorism in Ogoni and the Niger Delta.

He declared that environmental restoration of polluted oil sites remains central to Ogoni struggle and was one of the reasons Saro-Wiwa and other heroes laid down their lives.

He said while the people appreciate government’s efforts to end environmental nightmare in Ogoni, the slow nature of these efforts are becoming more frustrating and has the capacity to ignite a new round of conflict in Ogoniland, if nothing was done immediately.

Pyagbara explained that there has been intense pressure by government and international oil companies to re-enter Ogoni for resumption of oil production.

He warned that Ogoni people have long declared that oil assets in their land cannot be partitioned and allocated like dividing Africa to any investor without the free, prior and informed consent of Ogoni people, as guaranteed under international human rights law, particularly the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP).