Oil Spill in Ogoniland Amid Ongoing Clean-up Exercise
A new oil spill has been confirmed in the Ogoni area of Rivers State, Nigeria, complicating ongoing environmental clean-up efforts.
According the Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre (YEAC-Nigeria) the spill on August 6, 2025, in the Kpean Community, Ken-Khana District, Khana Local Government Area.
According to the report, the spill is alleged to have resulted from equipment failure on a wellhead, although the specific wellhead is yet to be independently confirmed.
Two paramount rulers in the area provided different accounts, with one indicating Oil Well 2 and the other stating Oil Well 4 in the OML 11 oil field.
These wells were abandoned by Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) in 1993 after they departed Ogoniland.
Dr. Fyneface Dumnamene Fyneface, Executive Director of YEAC-Nigeria, emphasized the need for immediate action to address the situation.
He said volunteers in the area reported hearing pressure sounds from the wellhead for several days before the spillage, suggesting that crude oil was struggling to emerge from the sealed Christmas Tree (Oil Well Head).
This raises concerns about the effectiveness of the ‘killing’ of oil wells by SPDC during a maintenance operation in 2011.
The Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre is calling on the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA) to conduct a joint investigation visit (JIV) to determine the actual cause of the spill.
However, the recent spill complicates ongoing clean-up efforts by the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP), particularly with the federal government’s oil production resumption discussions in Ogoniland.
Oil Spill in Ogoniland Amid Ongoing Clean-up Exercise is first published on The Whistler Newspaper
