Nigeria’s state oil company NNPC announced it has hired a firm owned by former militant Tompolo, whose movement’s attacks on facilities in the early 2000s crippled oil production, to protect installations and tackle rampant theft.
It was one of five security contracts awarded as theft and pipeline sabotage have cut Nigeria’s oil exports by nearly half a million barrels per day to 1.4-million bpd. Tompolo (real name Government Ekpemupolo) was once the leader of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta. This group made frequent attacks until a government program gave contracts to some militants to protect oil installations. The government issued a warrant for Tompolo’s arrest on corruption charges in 2016. Attacks resumed in 2016.
Paul Ebbenimibo spoke for Tompolo and said that the companies would protect pipelines from the states of Bayelsa, Delta Edo, Edo, Ondo, and Imo. Ebbenimibo stated that Tompolo had told others in the region not to steal from the pipelines and to accept security jobs to help the region’s economy rebound. The companies hired by NNPC include Global West, Labrador Security Outfit (Ocean Marine Solutions), Labrador Security Outfit (Labrador Security Outfit), Asari Dokubo, and a fifth unidentified company.
Hoodlums who are involved in the huge crude oil theft have caused the production level to reduce by 400,000 barrels per day (bpd), translating to a drop from 1.8 million to 1.4 million bpd, Nigeria’s Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, said recently. Sylva said that the federal government wanted the cooperation of state governments because oil host communities should work together to stop the alarming level of crude oil theft. It has now become an emergency situation.
Source: north africa post
