HYPREP Partners Lancaster University to Make Ogoni Centre of Excellence Environmental Research Hub, ,
Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt
The Project Coordinator of the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP), Prof. Nenibarini Zabbey, has disclosed that the agency is collaborating with the University of Lancaster to ensure that the Ogoni Centre of Excellence attains its full potential as a hub of environmental research upon its full operationalization.
While conducting an inspection tour of ongoing clean-up projects in Ogoniland with members of the HYPREP board of trustees, Prof. Zabbey said his team had already paid a working visit to Lancaster University to understudy its activities in the area of environmental research.
Zabbey added that an Australian institute would also partner with the Ogoni Centre of Excellence, which he said was 92 per cent complete, with furnishing constituting part of the remaining eight per cent.
Chairman of HYPREP’s board of trustees and leader of the inspection team, Emmanuel Deeyah, who spoke after inspecting the Wiiyaakara substation of the Ogoni Power Project and the Centre of Excellence, respectively, expressed satisfaction with the quality and level of work done by the contractors.
Deeyah promised that his board would play its part to ensure the completion of the projects within record time.
“From our own end, whatever we need to do to support the completion of this project, we will do so. We understand 92 per cent has been done, and what is left is just very little. We’re also impressed by the kind of things that are on the ground here, and we want to thank the federal government for their support.
As this remediation and cleanup are completed, we will have a facility here at home, and it will be a centre of excellence, a hub of research in environmental remediation and restoration. So we’re very proud of it and we encourage that more things like this be done so that long after, we’ll have something to fall back on,” he said.
The HYPREP BoT chairman thanked the minister of environment and the project coordinator for their commitment to the Ogoni clean-up exercise.
The project manager overseeing the Wiiyaakara sub power station, being constructed by Energovod, Emeka Chibuzor, disclosed that the project is expected to be completed around November 2026.
The HYPREP BoT also inspected the solar-powered Bomu Water Station, which is already complete and functional, as well as the K-Dere and B-Dere water projects. While the K-Dere water project is almost complete, that of B-Dere is stalled due to what the project manager termed a cost variation.
, Education – THISDAYLIVE, November 5, 2025, 8:48 am
