Review… Niger Delta militancy: Aggravating a bad situation

.In from Timothy Enietan-Matthews . . .

These are certainly perilous times for Nigeria’s economy. With crude oil, the nation’s mainstay, hitting an all-time low, the news of resumed hostilities in the Niger Delta region came as bad news; a development least anticipated at such a time. And as expected, it grabbed the front pages of major newspapers and the main headlines of online news media.

Niger Delta militancy and its attendant effect on the oil and gas sector and by extension, the Nigerian economy, is well known the world over. So the news of the resumption of hostilities in the Niger Delta, with the two incidents of pipelines blown up in Delta State, sent danger signals to Nigerians and others with interest in the oil and gas industry.

For those who are conversant with the struggle as some would like to describe it, criminality and resumption of hostilities in the Niger Delta may not be too surprising. The events leading to the blow up, and the personality involved must have suggested to those who have always followed developments in the area that the days ahead must indeed be pregnant with serious landmines.

So far, two goals have been put forward as motivation for the resumption of hostilities in that region. One is the travails of Government Ekpemulomu, popularly called Tompolo, who had been at loggerheads with the Federal Government, whose agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, dragged him to court, alongside a former Director General of NIMASA over an alleged N34 billion fraud. Before the EFCC approached the court, he was invited on several occasions, but Tompolo, who said he was yet to get an invite, failed to show up.

Eventually, a Federal High Court in Lagos issued a bench warrant for his arrest when he failed to appear after a court order that he must appear before it unconditionally.
The bench warrant seemed to have set the stage for the new face off in the oil rich region. The militants, whose identities are yet to be unraveled, responded the same night by blowing up a major oil supply pipeline in Delta State. Another round of blow up soon followed, ironically, in Tompolo’s main area of influence.

Though the ex-militant leader has tried to distance himself from the resumed hostilities, many Nigerians doubt his sincerity in the entire scenario, most especially, as news making the round suggest that the fellows who carried out the act are ‘boys’ loyal to the ex-militant leader.

But while distancing himself from the renewed aggression, Tompolo said those behind the pipelines’ vandalism were some ex-militants who are angry with him because he refused to support the All Progressives Congress, APC, in the Bayelsa governorship election. According to him, those behind the act wanted to exploit his current face-off with the Federal Government to implicate him as reacting to the faceoff by attacking national assets.

The second goal, according to available information is that some militants want to arm twist the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration into awarding them pipeline protection contracts as obtained in the previous administration, which lined the pockets of militants with hundreds of millions of naira.
Even though the identities, and by extension, the main aim of those behind the renewed onslaught on the pipelines are still unknown, one thing however is for sure, and that is the fact that assaults are nothing but serious drawbacks for the country and its already bleeding economy.

Few days after the attacks, the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, announced that three of the nation’s refineries have been shut down because of the breaches to supply pipelines. According to the NNPC, the two refineries in Port Harcourt and the other one in Northern city of Kaduna were affected by the shutdown, leaving only the Warri Refinery, producing a mere 1.4 litres of petrol per day still working. Similarly, a Chevron facility in the region was affected by the attacks, leaving the company with no option than to shut down its operations.

Read also: Clark to Buhari: Respect Niger Delta

The rippling effect of these attacks can only be imagined, not just on the oil and gas sector but also on other areas. The economy, with dwindling oil revenue will be the worst for it as there will be decreased volume in the face of criminally low prices. Also, the minister of works, power, housing, Babatunde Raji Fashola, disclosed that the country lost some megawatts of electricity due to the attacks!

What do the militants wants?

It will be difficult to pointedly say what the militants want from the Nigerian government since they have not come out to say anything, but it may be safe to say that they are certainly not fighting for the liberation of the region or resource control.

The last time the agitation in the region was on, the world was told that the militants and their leaders were fighting for the region and its people but immediately amnesty was granted them, the leaders became multi-billionaires while their foot soldiers depended on stipends monthly from government, even as the region remained unchanged, un-improved and worse.

So what do they want this time around? There are those who believe that the militants, by their action, are only trying to bully the Federal Government over the Tompolo issue and arm twist it into overlooking him and the case hanging on his neck, while others believe that the militants are looking for attention from the current administration, since the unfettered access they had to the seat of power, and the government patronage they enjoyed during the Goodluck Jonathan administration no longer existed.

If the latter should be the case, then they may be in for a lengthy wait, as President Muhammadu Buhari, true to character, dismissed their renewed agitation, describing them as easy targets that will be crushed.

However, the mindset of the President is similar to what former President Olusegun Obasanjo had during his presidency but had to wage a long unending war with the militants, a situation that caused a major dent on his second coming to power. Even at that, he was still unable to resolve the Niger Delta debacle, until he left office, handing it over to his successor, Shehu Musa Yar’Adua.

The militants have shown in time past that they are no easy targets and no pushover, especially where the creeks of the Niger Delta are concerned. The implication of this is that if a full scale confrontation may likely commence again, which may lead to another long round of violent skirmishes in the creeks. This, the nation may not be able to afford, especially with the “technically defeated” Boko Haram insurgency still lurking in the corner.

In a situation that may appear like being caught between the devil and the red sea, it will also be counterproductive for government to accede to whatever the militants want, as it would send a dangerous signal to others that government can be bullied at any time or arm twisted to achieve an end, no matter how criminal.

The question now is: If the hostilities continue, what does the government do, especially since a group that claimed responsibility for the attacks said they would not drop their arms until the Minister of State for Petroleum, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, “meets and negotiates” with them.

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