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Gov Diri Tasks Reps on PIB

The Governor of Bayelsa State, Douye Diri, has called on House of Representatives members to act fast and pass into law the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB.
Diri stated this while receiving members of the House Committee on Oil Spill Investigation, Clean-up and Remediation in the Oil Producing States at Government House, Yenagoa on Tuesday.
He noted that if the bill is passed, it will correct some of the injustices faced by oil-producing states.

The governor, in a statement through his Chief Press Secretary, Daniel Alabrah, also noted that if the PIB is passed into law, it will create an avenue to correct some of the wrongs of the oil companies in host communities, adding that the bill had been neglected for long by the National Assembly.
According to him: “Let me appeal that as you go, have a sincere interest in the PIB. The PIB has been there from one Assembly to the other.

“It is another way of ameliorating what we perceive as cheating on the part of the oil companies and Nigeria on the Niger Delta and its people.”
Diri, who also laments the negligence on the part of the oil companies and the Federal, stressed that the people have been suffering so much in terms of environmental degradation and pollution of water bodies leading to an increase in cancer cases and other strange ailments.

While comparing what is obtainable in the outside world where oil firms operate, the governor queried the standards applied by oil firms in their operations in the Niger Delta states.
Diri further called for clean-up of the entire Niger Delta, noting that the Ogoni clean-up, which was a mere fraction of the polluted environment from oil spills, attracted international attention.

In his words: “What happened in Ogoniland is the same in the whole of Niger Delta. That there is a clean-up in Ogoniland is, to say the least, a fraction of the Niger Delta. So the clean-up should be the whole of the Niger Delta,” he said, expressing optimism that the report of the committee would bring assistance to people of the area if implemented.
Earlier, the chairman of the committee, Amiru Tukur, said they were in Bayelsa state to verify some oil spill sites to ascertain the actual clean-up and remediation, adding that the outcome would form the basis of the report it would submit to the House.

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