Nigerians are jolted by a confession by a Nigerian investigative journalist, David Hundeyin, who claimed to have been contacted to blackmail Dangote
Hundeyin, disclosed how an International Non-governmental Organisation (INGO) offered him N800,000 to blackmail the 650,000 barrels per day Dangote Refinery.
Hundeyin, in a series of tweets on Saturday, explained that his decision to make it public was to send a message to the external interests working on the same path as those within the country who are determined to counteract the interests of half a billion West Africans.
Reacting to the revelation Henry Adigun, of energy institute and public affairs analyst said he knows the journalist and believes his story
Adigun, said it is very possible he could have been approached for such a hatchet job but expressed happiness for his courage to make it open.
According to him, one of the NGOs, wanted to contract him into blackmailing the refinery as dangerous to the environment.
Also reacting, the executive secretary of Journalists for Democratic Rights (JOEDER) Wale Adeoye said, “I think Hundeyin revelation is relevant to understanding the brutal, often blood-stained competition in the global market economy where individual and countries try to undo one another in the most bizarre manner.”
Adeoye continued, “If he was truly contracted to diminish Dangote, the question is, are there many other individuals, journalists, security agents or politicians that have been contracted to sabotage Dangote?
“Are there other business ventures in Nigeria, like the Ajaokuta Iron and Steel Company that remains stunted more than 40 years after it was established?”
According to the JODER scribe, it also raises the question: Does the Nigerian government give enough protection to indigenous companies? I don’t think so.
He said that protecting indigenous companies goes beyond providing police and escorts, there are other protective shields a government should provide for its indigenous companies especially in the context of global competition driven by information technology and the capacity of mass communication to influence demand and supply on the one hand and public perception on the other.
Adeoye added that the piece of Hundeyin was an indication that there are local and international forces working for personal gains who at the same time are determined to destroy Dangote refinery.
He went on to say that it is not just about Dangote as a person but they are fighting the whole gamut of local oil production which is one of the striking pillars that can lift Nigeria from economic ruin, adding As long as we produce crude and refine it abroad, Nigeria will never make progress.
“When we refine abroad, they bring only Petroleum while we loose more that 500 byproducts of Petroleum to the international cartels” he said.
Hundeyin said, “Last week, I received an N800,000 offer from an international NGO to write an article essentially saying that Dangote Refinery is terrible for the environment because something something “Environmental Concerns,” something something “Climate Change,” something something “Energy Transition Policy,” something something “COP 28.”
“The (unstated but clearly implied) thrust of the brief was for a prominent local voice to put their name on an article that is an argument or a premise for the Nigerian government to kill the refinery based on its “energy transition commitments” and “environmental policy.” This conclusion wasn’t immediately apparent when they reached out to me, but I suspected where it was heading, and I quickly accepted the offer so that I could see the brief and obtain hard evidence. I’ve attached screenshots from the brief below.
Continuing, Hundeyin explained the organisation is headed by an Oxford professor with funding from several American intelligence fronts, including an NGO which has been blacklisted in India for funding organisations against the nation’s interest.
“Basically, this London-based NGO is headed by an Oxford professor and is funded by several American intelligence fronts (which is blacklisted in India for funding organisations working against India’s national interest). For whatever reason, it is now quietly mobilising a resistance campaign against what it describes as “Nigeria’s first refinery.”
Apparently, the status quo of Africa’s largest oil producer having no functioning oil refinery to beneficiate its own oil was not a problem for the NGO and the American CIA fronts who fund it.
“The human poverty caused by exporting this raw material and importing refined fuel was not bad for the environment. Also, the fact of European refiners regularly blending West African fuel cargoes with toxic waste and sulphur content 200 times the European legal limit (leading to asthma, bronchitis and eye infections in West Africa) was also not bad for the environment. But Nigeria having a refinery that will wean West Africa off import dependency on those European refiners (and allow West Africa control the sulphur content of its own fuels) is where the NGO and its funders draw the line. That one is bad for the environment, and David Hundeyin should write an article calling for the refinery to be shut down or limited,” he added.
According to him, some Western interests believe Africans should not exist or have nice things, adding that, “apparently, the sole purpose of our existence is to enhance their experience of the planet and all that it has to offer.”
He added that disclosing his encounter with the London-based organisation was to pass a message that Africans cannot be convinced to campaign for the elongation of their own poverty by “commissioning $500 hack jobs in the hope that we will be greedy enough to only see the money and ignore the bigger picture of what we can clearly see you trying to do.”
When, contacted spokesman of Dangote group Anthony Chiejine did not respond to our inquiry.
