HYPREP Give Scholarship to 300 Post Graduates
Barikui Felix, Port Harcourt
Three hundred postgraduate students of Ogoni extraction pursuing their studies in different tertiary institutions have benefited from a Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) scholarship grant.
The beneficiaries received scholarship grants worth N200,000,000 for the project’s strategic approach to improving human capacity development in Ogoni land.
The beneficiaries, which comprised 200 Master’s and 100 Doctor of Philosophy, PhD, students, were selected through a process that started in October 2024, following the scheme’s announcement by the HYPREP Project Coordinator, Professor Nenibarini Zabbey. The 100 PhD beneficiaries received N1,000,000.00 each, while the 200 Master’s students received N500,000.00 each.
Speaking at the award ceremony in Port Harcourt, Professor Zabbey said beneficiaries were selected based on merit and demonstrates HYPREP’s commitment to fairness, transparency, and inclusivity in its interventions in Ogoni land, adding that the Project believes that education is a transformative tool that can unlock new opportunities and create sustainable alternative sources of livelihood for oil-impacted communities in the area.
Prof. Zabbey, while congratulating the beneficiaries, acknowledged their roles as critical stakeholders and agents of change in the communities, charging them to contribute to HYPREP’s ongoing environmental and livelihood restoration by bringing to bear their expertise to promoting peace and development at the community level and communicate the cleanup mandate.
”Your role as postgraduate students is beyond academia; you are peace-builders who must promote unity, collaboration, and peaceful coexistence within Ogoni communities and beyond. Your work and influence will serve as bridges to further connect Ogoni land, fostering continuous dialogue, mutual understanding, and collective action in the public interest,” he stressed.
The Project Coordinator, while attributing the project’s successes to the cooperation of the Ogoni community and the commitment of all stakeholders, informed that a significant number of the projects will be completed this year.
The projects to be commissioned include soil and groundwater remediation, shoreline cleanup, and mangrove restoration, the Center of Excellence for Environmental Restoration (CEER), the Ogoni Specialist Hospital, Buan Cottage Hospital, and the Ogoni Power Projects. He disclosed that more water projects will be commissioned this year and various livelihood enhancement activities will be rolled out as well.
Professor Zabbey disclosed that HYPREP will launch new projects this year to create more jobs and strengthen the employ-ability capacity of Ogoni youths and women, stating that digital ICT facilities will be installed in select secondary schools in Ogoni to aid learning.
Also speaking, the Head of Sustainable Livelihood, Mrs. Josephine Nzidee, reeled out the various livelihood intervention programmes of HYPREP and announced that the agency would, this year, support 2000 Ogoni farmers towards ensuring food security, provide research support grants for 200 Ogoni final year students and establish 20 more Environment Club ‘Green Frontiers’, explaining that members of the Green Frontiers will be trained to nurse and plant economic, fruit trees and vegetables in Ogoni communities as part of the Project’s beautification efforts.
She noted that people living with disabilities are not left out, as the Project will also roll out training for the group following the needs assessment it collected from them.
Furthermore, Mrs Nzidee said HYPREP will carry out specialized skill training in the following areas: seafaring, creative arts, mechatronics, commercial diving, and cyber security. This is in addition to the planned support for over 500 nano businesses, SMEs, and cooperatives targeted at growing the local economy.
