The depollution of the Niger Delta, faced with numerous oil spills, is a “ total failure » in Nigeria, according to representatives of the United Nations, according to documents revealed by the Associated Press agency. Despite significant funding, corruption and the lack of competence of the companies chosen to carry out these operations are to blame, according to these documents.
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Since the 1950s, the Niger Delta has suffered thousands of crude oil spills in its mangroves and farmlands.
The United Nations launched an initial investigation around ten years ago. In response, oil companies agreed to create a fund to finance the billion-dollar delta cleanup run by the Nigerian government, with UN teams providing technical support.
Incompetence and corruption
But today this program is a total failure. The documents revealed by the Associated Press (AP) agency blame incompetence and corruption and senior UN officials are concerned.
To supervise this work, the Nigerian government launched the “ oil depollution », entrusted to the public agency Hyprep. However, it called on companies not qualified for such a task, and the monitoring work is considered largely insufficient, even misleading.
In 2021, the UN therefore alerts the authorities and a new boss is appointed to head the Hyprep agency. But, while he launches an audit on past contracts, he is poached and his predecessor regains the position. UN support for Hyprep is withdrawn in 2023, officially for technical reasons. The documents cited by AP, for their part, indicate frustrations linked to corruption in the project.
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