The Joint-Chair, Ogoni Kingdom Development Forum, Prof Barika Saro-Laka, has implored President Bola Tinubu to change the leadership of the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP).

Saro-Laka, specifically, told President Tinubu to appoint either Dr. Life Kaanagbara or Dr. John Idamkue as Project Coordinator of HYPREP.

He lamented that Khana LGA had never produced anyone for the position of Project Coordinator of HYPREP.

He noted that for justice, decorum and fairness, the next project coordinator of HYPREP should be appointed from Khana Local Government Area of Ogoni Kingdom.

Saro-Laka, at a press briefing yesterday in Abuja, claimed that those appointed to coordinate the clean up of Ogoni land in the past had failed “woefully in delivering the official mandate of HYPREP, despite several billions of Naira already spent.”

According to him, the plea was that of the masses of Ogoni that HYPREP should be an effective instrument for promoting the sustainable development and progress of Ogoni.

He said: “We Implore Your Excellency to sincerely help Ogoni Kingdom and her natives to experience, for the first time, rapid development through the instrumentality of the only federal presence on the soil of Ogoni land known as the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP).

“The huge sacrifices of some core Ogoni patriots (Ogoni 13) forced the establishment of HYPREP by the Federal Government of Nigeria and we want the Federal Government under the able leadership of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, to do the right thing, by appointing a non-political nominee to head this agency.

“The key reason is because political nominees in the past failed woefully in delivering the official mandate of HYPREP, despite several billions of Naira already spent.

“It is the plea of the masses of Ogoni that HYPREP should be an effective instrument for promoting the sustainable development and progress of Ogonis.

“Thus, the patriotic and foundational work done on HYPREP by Mr. ‘Wale Edun and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) must not be allowed to waste in favour political nepotism, blindness, incompetence, impunity and sweeping theft.

“Some politicians without conscience and their stooges have stolen enough in HYPREP while Ogoni people and the spirits of those who lost their lives for its creation, are unhappy and unfulfilled.” (Saturday Sun: Text, Excluding Headline)

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