A retired diplomat and civil servant, Ambassador Godsknow Ighali, is the chairman of Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF). In this interview with OLAOLU OLADIPO, he assessed the Bola Tinubu led government with a verdict that though it (the government) has shown more than a passing interest in the affairs of the region, it must however address agelong environmental and infrastructural issues in the region. Excerpts:

Let me start with the decision of President Bola Tinubu to pardon some Ogoni leaders and also give some national awards. How do you see this, considering the history of the region in terms of the agitation for a better environment and some others…

Well, we thank the president for giving the pardon to them, although from a legal point of view, some have argued that they were not really criminals but again, they went through a judicial process and were pronounced to have committed crimes against the country and were executed. We thank the president, and we hope this will be part of the healing process in Ogoni land. It will go a long way.

As an elder in the region, what purpose do you think this gesture will serve in terms of the reconciliation process in the Niger Delta?

The gesture will serve, first and foremost, to help the Ogoni people to heal because you can imagine that nine family bread winners were killed. Not only three, there were nine families where there was judicial execution of them. There were four others who were also killed during that period. So, such pardon and national honors will help to heal the Ogoni land, which is a very important component of the Niger Delta region. Number two, at the broader Niger Delta level, it will show us that the country cares, and that this government cares about the people. The issues that bother the Ogonis matter.

That is, in that respect, I would also like to call on Mr. President to bring the issue of Okuoma in the Delta State, which happened when the military platoon was attacked and the officers were killed. The people have been displaced. And in Igbematoro, in Bayelsa State, the people have been displaced. In Okuoma, to the extent that the Okuoma traditional ruler died in detention, there is a need for peace on that matter. And in the same vein, I would like to call on Mr. President to look into the plight of the displaced people of Bakassi. That’s nobody has put a finality or closure to it. So there are Nigerians that were affected by the Green Tree Agreement on the Bakassi. And all these years, they are like people, stateless people, because their territories have been sold to Cameroon, their land transferred to Cameroon, and people came back to other parts of Nigeria to stay, especially in Cross River State, in Bayelsa State. They are living as internally displaced people, perpetually in their country, with no succour. The previous governments have not fully addressed this matter. And the way that Mr. President has tackled the Ogoni matter, I think this matter of Okuoma and the matter of the Bakassi people in the aftermath of the ICJ judgment should also be looked into.

The present government is almost two years six months in power now, if you are to assess the President Bola Tinubu led government with regards to how it has managed issues relating to Niger Delta, what would the scorecard be?

We’ll, I was asked that question this morning by another network and I told them that in line with the Constitutional provision, he has appointed people from the Niger Delta from different states as ministers and that is what the Constitution expects of him. But all we can say is, we thank him for doing so, and our sons are serving in his government. Our son and our brother, Senator Godswill Akpabio, is the President of the Senate under him.

This is happening now since after Joseph Wayas left that office in December of 1983, nobody had attained that position from the Niger Delta. So, we are happy that Mr. President has supported by appointing our sons. However, we see the efforts of the government in infrastructure development: EastWest Road, some good level of work has been done on East-West Road, and we are still urging him to take it to the end because in some sections, the Minister of Works himself has accepted that some of the contractors are incompetent. So, the incompetent contractors on East-West Road should be fired and proper contractors with the cognitive experience and expertise be brought in to finish the job. I am saying so because this road is critical.

It connects all the six states of the Niger Delta where the wealth of the country comes from. So, we urge Mr. President to take it to the next step by showing that East-West Road is what it should be. It leads from where the wealth is coming.

One week, two weeks of oil production can do the East-West Road and make it one of the best roads in the world. Number two, there are areas, for example, to go from Benin to Wari, we grew up in that area. We used to do it in one hour, one and a half hours. Today, it takes you like five hours because the section from Warri, from Benin to Oghara, the town called Oghara, Delta State, is impassable. It can take three or four hours. This matter has to be tackled because it’s affecting our people.

The Minister has said the contractors had performed below level. So fire them, put new contractors. You look to go from Benin to Auchi. Benin to Auchi, we used to do it in two and a half hours. Today, to go to Benin, to go to Auchi, you have to go into Ondo State, go into some sections of Ondo State, and from there clear the road, come down in Oghara area, which is very close to Kogi State, before you now come in around Auchi because you can’t pass the road. Again, we hear the contractors are incompetent.

So, the contractor should be sent away and a better contractor, so maybe Julius Berger or any of the other contractors of that level should be mobilised to do the road. The same thing, the road that is going from Calabar to a major oil producing area, the road is very bad.

Are you saying most of the contractors operating in the Niger Delta are incompetent?

There are contractors who are working, but we are not satisfied with the competence of some contractors and with the amount of work done. When work is done, we appreciate it. That’s why I said there’s measurable efforts in the East-West route, which we thank the president and his ministers but the minister works on his team. We all expect that the work will be taken to its completion.

Mr. President recently approved money for the ports, and we hope that the ports of the east, that is the Warri Ports, the Calabar Ports, the Port Harcourt Ports, will all come back to life because we are people of maritime. All our life we live in water. It’s water we know and all these ports are not working. It’s a big shame, but we are thankful that money has been devoted to the ports. I hope the money will not be sent to Tin Can and Apapa Ports alone. The money will also come to the ports in the Niger Delta.

We are watching developments in the oil industry, in NNPC. Oil industry and NNPC in particular, we are not happy as a people in the South-South. We don’t have enough people in the management and the board of the NNPC, we don’t have enough people but let me say this clearly, the SouthSouth of this country has the highest number of qualified people in the oil industry. University of Benin, University of Port Harcourt, University of Calabar, and PTI in Warri, these are the institutions where petroleum engineering, petrochemical engineering, chemical engineering, gas engineering, and so on were developed.

So we have manpower that can function well in the NNPC. Our state governments gave a lot of scholarships to our sons and daughters to go to foreign countries to study all areas of oil and gas. So, we have the mass of the people or manpower in the sector. So, when you appoint people into top positions in NNPC and the oil industry, but we don’t have our sons and daughters in such high positions but are given subsidiary positions. We find it very ridiculous because we can’t have the best of these things and we don’t put them to. The GMD position of NNPC should be given to somebody from the South-South. We are not asking for too much. So, those areas are areas we ap- peal to the president to keep looking into. It affects our people, particularly the members of his political party. You know, we in PANDEF don’t belong to any party.

We are non-partisan. But those in his party may not be able to say it, but in my position as national chairman of PANDEF, I should say that even those who don’t say it, they talk to me and they tell me, look, you people should talk, man. Why are we not in the management of the industry? The president should look into it because our people are not happy. The board of NNPC, we are very little there. The management, we are very little. We have two of our sons there. We think that the top best position should be allotted to our people. Well, what in the general sense he has done, he is doing his best, and we will continue to encourage him to do his best.

What are the responsibilities of PANDEF in all these?

We are cooperating with the government to increase oil production, to increase gas production. We will keep peace in our area. We will encourage our sons who are keeping the peace, particularly Tantita and Pipeline Infrastructure Limited, to continue to do their job to maintain peace in the Niger Delta. Our traditional rulers are working with them to make sure that there is peace in the Niger Delta.

We work closely with the NDDC to do their outreach to communities to ensure that there is peace. We support our two sons, Henneken Lokpobiri, the Minister of Petroleum, and the Minister of Gas, Ekperikpe Ekpo so that there can be peace. They keep telling us that we take this message of traditional rulers to the youth and the women, and we’ll continue to support Mr. President and support Nigeria to ensure that we produce more oil. This is why we encourage what is happening in Ogoni. If more oil comes out of Ogoni, let us learn our lessons, Mr. President and the Federal Government, that the Ogoni environment should not be polluted like the rest of the Niger Delta. And let’s work as a coalition.

In what area and how do you want the Federal Government to intervene to address the issue of environmental degradation?

There are two major reports, the UNEP Report of 2011, and the World Committee of Experts Support led by the Archbishop of York, described as environmental genocide, what has occurred in the Niger Delta. It is their reports, not conducted by us, but by global experts. Now, that environmental genocide shows that the Niger Delta is the most polluted environment on the face of the Earth. This is what the UNEP Report of 2011 says. What we need is remediation, gradual remediation. It should take many, many years to get the environment back, and that’s because of poor regulation.

We are not saying it’s the present government that caused it. No! Oil exploration has been taking place since 1956, and this poor regulation of the environment has made our oil spillage to become the order of the day, and gas flaring, the order of the day. These are going down because of government effort. Thus, remediation, get the environment back gradually. It must not only be Ogoni, it must be spread to all parts of the Niger Delta environment. Pilot programmed similar to what’s happening in Ogoni should happen everywhere. In the Niger Delta, children are being born with- out hands, without eyes, without parts of their bodies because of the pollution. The UNEP Report and other reports say that the environment is polluted, they say that when you plant a crop and you eat, you are just eating poison. So, what we want is remediation.