NIGERIA: Nigerian militants threaten to reduce oil production if government fails to stop troop build up

Record ID: 234650

  • Title: NIGERIA: Nigerian militants threaten to reduce oil production if government fails to stop troop build up
  • Date: 23rd July 2008
  • Summary: MILITANTS SINGING AND WAVING MACHINE GUNS
  • Embargoed: 7th August 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Nigeria
  • Country: Nigeria
  • Topics: War / Fighting,Industry
  • Reuters ID: LVAD6NVE5V2T7Y2UJ2LTAJDQ6ZR8
  • Story Text: A Nigerian militant group affiliated to the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) said on Thursday (July 17) it would attack oil companies and reduce the production process in the oil rich Niger Delta to a minimum if government failed to stop troop build up in the area.
    The Okoloma Ikpangi group camp leader, Commander Boma said the struggle for a better life for the people of the region would continue to the bitter end and government intimidation would fail to stop them.
    "If the government is wise, they should evacuate all those military presence, without shooting innocent people. We are not useless people, we are enlightened enough to know what we want and we are fighting for," Boma said.
    Bomb attacks on pipelines in the delta, the hub of Africa's biggest oil industry which produces around 2 million barrels per day, have disrupted supplies from the world's eighth biggest oil exporter and helped push global energy prices to record highs.
    "We are going to reduce the production rate of all those companies to the barest minimum. All those multinationals in our community, we are going o stop their production, and we are working towards that. And it's very soon," Boma said.
    Boma and an unknown number of his men have set up camp in the Bony area, close to the home of Africa's largest investment in a liquid to gas plant (LNG) and a lift-off terminal of crude for more that five multi-national oil companies.
    The group said that to attack the multi-nationals would not take much.
    "We just wake up one morning, we walk down there and cause any havoc we like, " said Boma adjusting the black balaclava hiding his face.
    Boma also demanded that the government release Henry Okah, a Niger Delta militant held by the Nigerian government. "They should release him.
    They should release Henry Okah otherwise part of this fight and everything, they are going to see more" Boma said.
    Nigeria's oil rich Niger Delta is a hotbed of militant groups, some of whom have enganged in acts of criminality and oil theft.
    The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) launched itself onto the international stage in January 2006 by taking hostage foreign oil workers and attacking oil installation resulting in the reduction of oil production by roughly a fifth. Other smaller militants groups have sought to be affiliated with the more organized MEND.
    In a new development, MEND said on Wednesday (July 22) it would attack major oil pipe lines in the next 30 days to prove it had not received payment of $12 million from government officials to end its campaign.
    The head of the state-run oil firm NNPC was quoted in Nigerian newspapers on Wednesday as saying the company had paid militant groups $12 million to protect facilities including the Chanomi creek pipeline in Delta state.
    "MEND is aware that huge payments have been made to some criminal gangs in the Delta state as protection fee," the group said in an e-mailed statement to Reuters.
    "To prove that we are not a part of this deal, the Chanomi creek pipeline and other major pipelines will be destroyed within the next 30 days," it said.
    Anglo-Dutch giant Royal Dutch Shell has a pipeline in the Chanomi creek, which feeds into the Forcados oil export terminal.
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