Public health emergency, UNEP environmental assessment and the clean-up of Nigeria’s Niger delta

There is a growing recognition of the critical need to clean up oil spills and other oilrelated pollution in Nigeria's Niger Delta in order to avert a looming public health disaster. Immediately after the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) published its landmark report on the environmental assessment of Ogoniland in Nigeria's Niger Delta in August 2011, there was global optimism that the Nigerian government might finally act to clean up the area's environment heavily polluted by decades-old oil spills. Upon receiving the report, the government of Goodluck Jonathan promptly constituted the Hydrocarbon Pollution Restoration Project (HYPREP) agency to oversee the cleanup project. Further action was stalled and the severe pollution-related environmental and public health challenges enumerated in the report persist in the Niger Delta. The 2015 election of Mohammedu Buhari, who was widely perceived as a reformer, rekindled belief that the clean-up program might finally be implemented. This paper discusses the factors that contributed to the non-implementation of the report, as well as the measures the government of Mohammedu Buhari has taken to get the report finally implemented.