unep report: Ogoni protest non-implementation 3 months after

Ogoni people, onMonday, took to thestreets of Port Harcourt to protest the Federal Government's failure to act on the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) report on environmental pollution in Ogoniland more than three months after it was submitted.The placard-carrying multitude, mobilised by the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) and led by its president, Ledum Mitee, marched through the ever busy Aba expressway to the Rivers State Government House, where they submitted a protest letter to the state governor, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, to be delivered to President Goodluck Jonathan.According to the letter of protest, Ogoni people expressed displeasure over the negligence with which a matter as serious as the dire environmental situation in Ogoniland had been treated.They noted that failure to act aptly on serious issues as the 'matter of life and death' as currently exists among the people, which the report had indicated required urgent attention, might lead to a fresh round of conflict in the oil-rich region.'It has been three months since the report was submitted to the Presidency with details that demanded immediate action. Since then we have been told of high level meetings and the formation of inter ministerial committees but the Ogoni people have not heard from you or the Federal Government.'As Your Excellency will no doubt be aware, these are not theoretical risks but reports of exposure to a daily hazard for which UNEP recommended immediate actions and health checks in these communities'If the cavalier attitude by government and oil company officials to communities across the Niger Delta-especially more peaceful areas such as Ogoni-continues then unwittingly, the seed of a swift and bitter return to conflict would have been sown,' the people noted.Receiving the protesters, the state's deputy governor, Tele Ikuru, who stood in for the governor, said their message had been received and assured that it would be taken to Abuja for appropriate action.
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