We are neglected by oil firms, our environment degraded, our people contact polluted-environment related illness
Ikpeazu visits the community
Abia govt laments non-payment of tax by oil firm workers

BY ANAYO OKOLI

UMUAHIA — ABIA State is one of Nigeria’s oil producing states. It attained this status by virtue of oil wells in Owaza community of Ukwa West Council, a rural boundary community between Abia and Rivers states. According to elderly indigenes of the community, oil exploration started in the area in 1958 and soon after, oil was found in Oloibiri, Bayelsa State. Shell Petroleum Development Company has been the sole oil firm operating in the area with scores of servicing firms until last year when Total, among others, came in to commence operations there.

Shell is said to operate 80 oil wells in the community – Imo River, which is the largest by any oil firm in the area. The people thus said they had over 80 oil wells.

We are neglected by oil firms-Indigenes

However, Owaza indigenes are lamenting that the oil in their area had rather been more of a curse than blessing due to the neglect and activities of the firms operating there.

•protesting Owaza youths and women.

Overzealous soldier

They complained of alleged total neglect by Shell which had been operating in the area for over 50 years. According to them, apart from scholarship schemes for indigenes of areas of its operation, their qualified youths are not given employment just as there are no social amenities like good drinking water, electricity, schools among others, despite the huge profit the company had been scooping from their oil wells.

Even at that, they lamented that the selection process for the scholarship scheme was not clear to them as those they chose were mostly strangers as the company never liaised with them over the issue.

Protest: Not happy with what was happening in their community, Owaza youths and women last week held peaceful protest in front of the facilities of the oil firms. The protest almost resulted in a bloody clash when an overzealous soldier escorting workers of one of the oil firms from Port Harcourt to Owaza shot into the air to disrupt the peaceful protest. The youths who were angered by this almost engaged the soldiers but for the intervention of some community leaders who calmed the situation for the protest to continue.

Grievances: The four traditional rulers from the autonomous communities that make up Owaza, including Eze Obioma Nworgu of Etiti-Oha Ipu, Eze Jonathan Ezere of Igiriukwu Ipu, Umungede and Eze Young Ogbonna, were unanimous in their views that the oil firms have not done much to develop their communities.

According to the Paramount Ruler of Owaza Kingdom, Eze Ogbonna, who reportedly retired from Shell, “To be fair to my people and Shell that has been operating here since 1958, Shell has not done much because there was no agreement between the community and SPDC. Oil is controlled by the Federal Government, so, simply put, we have not benefited from Shell.

“The negative impact is unquantifiable. Even a layman knows that the community is polluted. Our roofs don’t last. The soil fertility has been destroyed; the ecosystem has been destroyed. Our youths are not given jobs. Our appeal is for the government to implore the oil companies to do more for the communities. In as much as we are not into militancy activities and we don’t want to go into such, the government should compensate peaceful oil producing communities.”

Militancy activities

The Youth Leader, Mr. Augustine Nwarie, said, “Owaza as an oil producing community has been neglected by Shell,”adding that the Federal Government was not fair by not including youths from the area in all its amnesty programmes, perhaps because they were not involved in militancy activities.

Nwarie said the youths under his watch would continue to maintain peaceful disposition but called on the Federal Government to extend its amnesty programmes to Owaza youths. He lamented that Shell had not given jobs to the 5000 qualified youths in the area, pointing out that the oil firms should also build roads and provide potable drinking water for the community among other social amenities.

The youth leader said that the community must enter into a Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, with Total and other new oil firms coming to the area to avoid a repeat of what they were presently suffering.

According to one of the Owaza community leaders, Chief Sam Nworgu, the Abia State government does not benefit from the staff of the various oil firms operating there as none of them paid their taxes to the state. He said that all the workers paid their taxes to Rivers State where they lived and were ferried under military escort from Port Harcourt to Owaza on daily basis to work. He asked Shell to compel their staff to live in the community; so that it would have the interest to develop the area.

Ikpeazu visits Owaza

Following complaints of neglect and protest by the people of Owaza community, Governor Okezie Ikpeazu undertook a fact finding tour of the community during which he invited officials of the oil companies with facilities in Owaza to a meeting in Umiuahia. According to Ikpeazu, the meeting was aimed at resolving the differences between the oil companies and their host communities for the mutual benefit of all the parties, including the state government.

Ikpeazu urged oil companies operating in the state to maintain cordial relationship with their host communities, saying that whatever misunderstanding that existed between them and Owaza community would be resolved amicably.

He commended the youths of Owaza and Ukwa West for their peaceful disposition and calmness towards the oil companies operating in their area as well as for not taking to militancy activities. He also asked the companies not to take the peaceful disposition and calmness of the youths for granted, as such disposition was not a sign of weakness.

The governor frowned at the level of gas flaring at ground level at the Isimiri flow station and warned of its attendant adverse effects on the host community.