Nearly six months after a flow station belonging to Shell in the Akuku-Toru Local Government Area of Rivers State was shut down, protesting residents of the area are still occupying the facility.
The residents, who were said to be from Offoinama, Belema and Ngeje, took over the facility in August 2017.
Speaking to some members of the Pan-Niger Delta Forum led by Chief Timi Ogoriba, the spokesman for the protesting residents, High Chief Ibiosiya Sukubo, explained that they were not ready to leave the flow station.
Sukubo explained that the youths would not leave the flow station until the withdrawal of Shell’s operational lease for OML25.
He pointed out that communities in Kula had faced environmental degradation as a result of Shell operation in the area.
Sukubo added that the host communities in the area were without social amenities such as pipe-borne water, electricity and good health facilities, maintaining that the negative impact of oil production had reduced life expectancy to a low level.
“We are prone to serious ecological hazards like earthquake and tsunami. The natural source of income which is fishing has been a diminution.
“There is no potable water, good school, electricity, roads, health facilities in the area. In fact, life expectancy is very low, hence in early August 2017, the communities rose up in anger and shut down its (Shell) operations in OML25 especially at the expiration of its lease.
“The information was that SPDC is concluding plans to divest its interest in the said field to an indigenous company which further exacerbate opprobrium; hence the Kula communities of Belema, Offoinama and Ngeje stood up to resist it.
“We made our position very clear during our meeting with the NNPC in Abuja that divestment must be transferred to Belema Oil and Gas Company, which is an indigenous company with a good track record,” he said.
A resident of the area, Mrs. Ekine Johnbull, who was one of those that took over the flow station in Belema, vowed that the communities would not leave the facility until the Federal Government transferred Shell’s lease licence to Belema Oil.
Responding, Chief Timi Ogoriba, who led the PANDEF delegation to the area, explained that the delegation was on a fact-finding mission to the communities, promising to submit their findings to the forum.
Ogoriba assured the protesting residents that PANDEF would subsequently submit such findings to relevant government agencies.