Amid warnings and threats from the presidency and military authorities to crush the Niger Delta Avengers and halt the bombing of oil facilities, the group has become more emboldened under President Muhammadu Buhari’s watch, writes Assistant Politics Editor, DANIEL KANU.
By Thursday, June 2, it became apparent that the crisis in the Niger Delta has taken the form of a full-blown combat. Niger Delta Avengers (NDA), the new face of militancy in the oil-rich region – has vowed to cripple Nigeria. And they are making good their threat through open confrontation and colossal damage of oil pipelines.
Given the heightened tension in the region, President Muhammadu Buhari had to cancel his scheduled visit to Niger Delta that Thursday to flag off the clean-up of oil spillage which has devastated the land over the years.
NDA told Buhari not to come for the flag-off exercise, if he still valued his life.
Same Thursday, they blew up another pipeline in Bayelsa State, taunting both the Presidency and the military.
In fact, the group has vowed to launch its rocket bomb on Tuesday, June 7, as well as endanger the airspace.
The Avengers are daring. They had threatened to permanently shut down operations on all oil blocks reportedly belonging to Northerners. On Thursday, May 12, it gave a two-week ultimatum for the evacuation of workers from the locations or have them blown up.
“It will be bloody. So, just shut down your operations and leave,” the Avengers in a statement forwarded by the group’s spokesperson, Mudoch Agbinibo, threatened.
Already, oil firms are evacuating workers and some closing shop from the troubled region.
The genesis
Of course, the problem of the region did not start with Buhari.
Successive governments have suffered confrontations with some vocal militant groups from the region such as the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP) and Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta (MEND), but NDA seem to be the latest emergence with the mandate not only to cripple the Buhari government but to seek sovereignty for the Niger Deltans.
Hostilities with previous governments lead to the Odi massacre in 1999 during the Presidency of Olusegun Obasanjo as well as the Gbaramatu mayhem in 2009 under the late President Umaru Yar’Adua.
While Obasanjo approached the situation with military force, Yar’Adua delved deeper in solving the situation as he produced repentant militants amnesty.
The reason was simply to give the area, noted as the greatest producer of the nation’s wealth via oil, greater sense of belonging in terms of infrastructure, environmental and human development. Even a Niger Delta Ministry was created by Yar’Adua to ensure the region was no longer neglected. This was aside other interventionist government agencies in the area like the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC).
Immediate past President, Goodluck Jonathan, a Niger Deltan, who was Vice President during the Yar’Adua regime, was known to have sustained the amnesty programme during his tenure and even improved the benefits enjoyed by the area.
Most of the youths from the region were empowered, and as a result youth restiveness ebbed.
Buhari in the opinion of most political observers is seen as having a hard stance on issues concerning the region.
Many also believe that the defeat of Jonathan, an incumbent, in the 2015 presidential election may also not be unconnected with the angst in the region.
Most people from the region feel that Jonathan was pushed out of office not because he did not perform, but by a well coordinated underground gang-up championed by the North to wrest power from the minority Ijaw ethnic group.
Many oil wells gone; more to go?
So far, the country has witnessed the bombing of Forcados pipeline, Bonga Oil field, Chevron trunk lines and other oil and gas installations.
Just before midnight on Thursday, May 26, the strike force of the Avengers successfully blew up an oil trunk line belonging to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
Also, it was with the same daredevilry that this new face of militancy had similarly tweeted that it blew up a deepwater crude pipeline belonging to American oil giant, Chevron, near Abiteye in Warri South-West Local Government Area of Delta State.
There are growing lamentations by the federal government and other stakeholders about the huge financial losses due to the drastic cuts created by the series of oil facility bombings, just as the electricity supply in most parts of the country hit very low levels owing to the shortage of gas supply to the electricity generation companies (Gencos).
Despite the fall in oil price in the international market, the volume produced is decreasing by the day owing to the attacks on pipelines. For instance, Chevron, after suffering loss due to the attack on its Okan offshore production platform, said it was losing 35,000 barrels per day.
Currently, Nigeria’s crude oil production ahs ebbed to 1.6 million barrels per day from more than 2 million barrels per day.
The mayhem unleashed by the group seems to be increasing by the day, as the Avengers have vowed to make the country ungovernable for Buhari. They had further warned via its Tweeter handle: “To the International Oil Companies (IOCs) and the Nigeria military, watch out! Something big is about to happen and it would shock the whole world.”
FG combat-ready
Buhari has vowed that the group must be eliminated immediately to end “their vandalism”. The President gave fresh orders for the new militant group to be hunted down and destroyed.
“The President gave special instruction to the military, especially to the Chief of Naval Staff, that this ugly development of vandals in the Niger Delta should end immediately,” a presidential aide that pleaded anonymity disclosed.
While assuring that government can checkmate the threat of the Avengers, Mr. President urged the militants to embrace the peace being offered by government.
At the moment, Abuja is not handling the issue with kid gloves, as it has deployed five warships, 100 gunboats and fighter jets to the creeks of the Niger Delta, in response to continued bombing of oil and gas pipelines by the Avengers. This heightened tension in the coastal communities of Southern Ijaw Local Government Area, even as military helicopters were seen hovering at low altitude in the predominantly riverine council.
It was gathered that while the air force deployed the fighter jets and helicopters, the army swooped on Ijaw communities, particularly Gbaramatu Kingdom in Warri South-West, searching for the militants.
Acting Director, Defence Information, Brig. General Rabe Abubakar, confirmed the directive. “We have the order from the President and we are monitoring the activities of the new group. All efforts will be made to bring out those behind it.
“The suspects, who perpetrated the first vandalism, were apprehended and paraded… The President has come under mounting pressure to deal with Niger Delta militancy recently.
“These ones are not going to be different. We are going out on our operation to stop and apprehend them in accordance with the presidential directive.
“Nobody is happy about it, but we are not deterred from doing what we are doing. And more proactive measures would be put in place. What they are doing is complete economic sabotage; it is economic terrorism,” the General said.
TheNiche gathered that all security operatives in the country are currently on their toes following security reports that the Avengers promised to resume hostilities after the expiration of its two-week ultimatum.
A house divided
A big minus in the struggle by the NDA is that its house does not appear to be in order.
The perception by some other communities within the region is that it is an Ijaw affair.
Ijaw is one of the ethnic groups in Niger Delta believed to be dominating others.
A coalition of youths drawn from some oil and gas producing communities in Delta condemned the violent activities of the NDA. According to the youths drawn from Urhobo, Isoko, Itsekiri and Ndokwa in the state, the militant group does not enjoy their blessings, warning them to desist, as the region does not belong to the Ijaw ethnic nationality alone.
President of Urhobo youths, Terry Obieh; and his counterparts from Itsekiri, Esimaje Awani; Ndokwa, Benjamin Onwubodu; and Isoko, Egbo Okemena, in a communique issued during the week condemned the recent attacks on oil facilities in the region.
Part of the statement reads: “We also know that the so-called Avengers do not represent the reasonable Ijaw ethnic nationality whom they try to muddy through their shadowy disposition.
“The Ijaw ethnic nationality has since submitted to and continues to benefit from the Presidential Amnesty Programme.
“Their various associations have also issued statements to this effect. We therefore find it preposterous for a band of misguided fellows claiming God-knows-what nationality to be unleashing daylight violence on the entire region while giving the entire region very bad names.
“You cannot engage in one wrong to cure another wrong, and to that extent the purported Avengers’ struggle is actuated by an overarching ambition with which we will not be identified.
“There are more peaceful ways to draw the attention of government to a cause, however germane, and not through the unconscionable and mindless destruction of the facilities that serve the entire nation.”
Delta State Governor, Ifeanyi Okowa has also cried out, saying the activities of the NDA qas taking a great toll on the economy and development of his state.
And the solution is…
Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar said the Niger Delta issue should be handled with a stick and carrot approach.
Commenting on the issue on Tuesday in Abuja where he was the chairman at the launch of a book, We Are All Biafrans written by Chido Onumah, he cautioned that wrong tactics would not produce the needed result.
“I think the Niger Delta should be handled with a stick and carrot approach. In 2007, before I ran for President, I met with various stakeholders on the Niger Delta issue and they came up with a policy. Part of the recommendations was that the ministry be moved to the Niger Delta and not Abuja. We have had administrations that did not do their homework on the Niger Delta.
“If I had won, I would have sold 10 per cent shares in the NNPC; that will give me $20 billion which would build infrastructure for the Niger Delta. But we always end up with accidental leadership.
“Bring peace and development to the Niger Delta, they will stop blowing up pipelines. Then, we will get gas and then power can be stable. But until then, we will not get it,” Atiku noted.
Acting president of Ijaw National Congress (INC), Charles Ambaiowei, said the plethora of failed promises by successive governments was responsible for the anger the nation is witnessing today. For him, the neglect of the region has reached a boiling point that has become unbearable hence the unrest in the region.
Ambaiowei disclosed that all correspondence their congress sent to Buhari was not responded to, cautioning that government must apply an approach with a human face. He suggested the need for government to dialogue with leaders from the region to set the tone of genuine peace.
“There are leaders of the ethnic nationalities in the region, and government needs to open communication with them. We are not in support of what the Avengers are doing, so you cannot punish the entire region because of few individuals that choose to be outlaws. There is the need for strategic, meticulous and undelayed process to fix the region,” he suggested.
Security consultant, Capt. Umar Aliyu (rtd.), said the situation in the Niger Delta “is very delicate”, cautioning that there should be a pragmatic approach.
Ekiti State governor, Ayo Fayose, has asked Buhari to toe the path of wisdom and apply the late Yar’Adua’s approach and improve upon it.
