After taking a hard and wide look at the social and economic situation of Nigeria, a renowned environmental activist and Executive Director of Health of Mother Earth Foundation ( HOMEF), Dr Nnimmo Bassey, has declared that the country was better off before crude oil became the country’s dominant source of revenue.

Bassey spoke in Port Harcourt while delivering the keynote address at the Correspondents’ Week of the Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, Rivers State Council with the theme: “The Imperatives of Comprehensive Cleanup of the Niger Delta Environment: Role of the Media”.

While noting that Nigeria’s dependence on oil has destroyed agriculture, weakened infrastructure development and reduced economic viability despite decades of petroleum wealth, he declared  that “Nigeria was better off without oil.”

He also said, ” Before oil was discovered, we had vibrant education, good infrastructure. In fact, we had the best roads built in the 50s and 60s in some places. We had agriculture. Nigeria was the main exporter of food before oil became a major revenue earner.”

He recalled that Nigeria once had a thriving productive economy driven by agriculture before the country became heavily reliant on crude oil earnings.

“And then our Head of State then said, ‘the problem is not money but how to spend it.’ Then we started spending, started borrowing. But the first borrowing was built on the fact that Nigeria was very wealthy because we had so much money in foreign banks, ” he said.

The international environmental activist also argued that oil extraction merely deepened colonial economic structures in Africa, where raw materials are exported while local populations remain impoverished.

“Extractivity is colonial, just like the idea of cash cropping,” he said adding that instead of cultivating okra, yam and so on, you are planting cotton, cocoa and you don’t make chocolate. You export and make money with no food to feed yourself.”

He further called on Nigeria to embrace alternative global economic alliances such as BRICS to counter what he described as the dominance of Western powers over the world economy.

“That’s why when you have a group like the BRICS, we should be supporting the BRICS and breaking the monopoly of control of the global economy by certain governments or countries in the world.”

Bassey also warned that Nigeria risks abandoning the Niger Delta to permanent ecological devastation if urgent environmental cleanup is not carried out before the world eventually phases out fossil fuels.

He rhetorically asked ” So, now, the issue of transiting away from oil, whether we like it or not, oil will one day be phased out. Now, when that happens, what will happen to Nigeria?

“Is it when oil is no longer needed, we’re going to find money to clean the Niger Delta? No, we will not. If the Niger Delta is not cleaned now, when people are still buying oil, then what happens when we stop selling”.

He accused multinational oil companies of profiting from environmental destruction while communities suffer pollution and poverty.

“Clean up the mess. Nobody has the right to poison my water, poison my soil, poison my air, and then run away to the bank with profits. That is totally immoral and unacceptable,” he said.

Bassey specifically fingered major oil operators, like NNPCL, Shell. Chevron or Renaissance, insisting that all International Oil Companies (IOCs) operating in the Niger Delta must be held accountable for environmental degradation.

The environmental campaigner also rejected the routine attribution of oil spills to vandalism, insisting that ageing pipelines and operational failures account for many incidents in the Niger Delta.

“There was a period in the history of Nigeria when third-party interferences were advertised in the media. When we had militants, they would say they were going to blow up pipelines and they blew it off. So I cannot say it didn’t happen.

“But to blend everything and blame every oil spill on vandalism, I don’t agree. When you see rotten pipelines, pipelines put in exposed places, not protected, not replaced when they are meant to be replaced, then it sounds silly to blame every spill on vandalism, ” he stated.

According to him, many oil pipelines in the region have exceeded their operational lifespan and should have been replaced decades ago.

“Your pipelines laid over 50 years ago are obsolete, expired and ought to be replaced.”

Bassey further criticised continued gas flaring in oil-producing communities, despite several court rulings declaring the practice illegal.

“What we need to do is to stop gas-flaring. Stop gas-flaring because it’s an iniquity and it’s against the right to life.”

He said communities are increasingly forced to seek justice in foreign courts because environmental rulings delivered by Nigerian courts are often ignored.

“That’s why communities tend to go to foreign courts. And now the companies see that they cannot dodge judgment in their own countries. They want to change their names and say that they’re now owned by Nigerian companies so that you cannot go to London or the Netherlands to sue them. They are divesting to evade responsibilities.”

He further charged the media to continue drawing attention to the environmental crisis in the Niger Delta, because government can no longer pretend that conditions in the region are normal.

“The fact that we are holding this conference today is a message to the government at all levels. They cannot keep on pretending that all is well because all is not well, ” he concluded.