Abuja, Nigeria – Mediaage NG News – The Director General, National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA), Idris O. Musa on Monday called for intervention to stop the activities of illegal oil refining in the Niger Delta region of the country.
In this regard, he said the agency had in the past collaborated with the Office of the Senior Special Assistant to former President Muhammadu Buhari on Niger Delta, Senator Ita Enang to look into the operations of those involved in Illegal oil refining. He faulted the inability of oil companies to report these activities.
“We have seen that this is a reoccurring problem and it is bad business for the environment. Is it not high time we start looking at alternatives?”, Mr. Musa said,while speaking with the press at the ongoing interactive session on the 2024-2026 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper (FSP) in Abuja, the Nigerian capital.
“Those who engage in it are not riff raffs, they are well read people – Chemical Engineering, Petrolchemical Engineering, Geologists. They are probably even educated than some of us. They have gone as far as trying to produce PMS and that’s why you see most times, fire engulfing them”, he added.
However, describing the illegal oil refining activities by those involved, as negativity, Musa said it could still be turned into positivity “by making sure that we group them into cooperatives, fine tune the technology they use, and make money out of it”.
“That’s what we are trying to see and I think efforts are geared towards taking a look at that side. If we have that, they will be the police of the environment themselves and make sure that whoever does not have a business with the environment, is not allowed to operate. You can police yourself better than any policeman assigned to you”, he concluded.