The Senate committee on Environment on Tuesday heard that the sum of $360 million has so far been received for the clean up of Ogoniand.
Out of the $360m, $43m has been released to the Hydrocarbon Pollution Environment Project, the agency set up to supervise the clean up.
Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Ogoni Clean Up project, Mr. Olawale Edun, disclosed this on Tuesday.
Also, the Project Coordinator, Hydrocarbon Pollution Environment Project, Dr. Marvin Dekil, confirmed receipt of the $43 million.
He however noted that money was not the challenge of the clean up exercise was not money but, technical factors and a sluggish procurement process.
READ ALSO: Oil Resumption Campaigners behind Killings in Ogoni – MOSOP
The $360 million was raised from contributions from multinational oil companies in the last two years towards the $1 billion the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) report said was required to clean up Ogoniland.
The contribution is still short of $40million which the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and the Ogoniland BOT are meant to collect from local operators and refineries.
Meanwhile, Chairman of Senate committee on Environment, Ike Ekweremadu has expressed disappointment that two years after the fund was released not one site out of the 65 contaminated sites marked for clean up and remediation has been certified “clean.”
The committee has therefore directed the Ministry of the Environment supervising the project to fashion out new strategies that would move the project forward.
