- Niger Delta Avengers: FG negotiating with fraudsters
Emmanuel Addeh in Yenagoa
The Joint Niger Delta Liberation Force, JNDLF, has threatened to blow up 10 oil and gas facilities in Bayelsa to express their displeasure with the handling of the ongoing crisis in the region.
While making its own threats, the JNDLF, which said its members had been meeting in Yenagoa, vowed that the oil and gas pipelines running from Ogboinbiri in Southern Ijaw of Bayelsa state to Obrinkon in Ikwerre LGA of Rivers state are “to be finally cut off from transmission.”
It added in a statement by Gen Akotebe Darikoro (Commander, General Duties), Torunnanaowei Latei (Creeks Network Coordinator) and others that the group would immediately proceed to bomb the flow stations of Ogboinbiri, Oporoma, Peremabiri, Tabidaba, Nembe, Brass, Chevron platform in Koluama, Okordia-Zarama and Biseni, including Gbarain-Ubie gas gathering plant.
“We further warn those staying around and within those areas to please leave because our mission is to cripple the economy of the country and not to kill any human being on earth.
“The Nigerian security who are claiming they are securing the oil facilities in the region should stay away at their dwelling places and see whether their safety will be guaranteed by the music on those days”, it vowed.
While commending the Minister of state, Petroleum Resources, Dr I’ve Kachikwu, “ for the bold steps he personally took to resolve the injustice created and sponsored by the wicked companies and government in Nigeria”, the group claimed that its struggle was beyond monetary gains.
“Our Field Commanders have been instructed what to do and those who are on standby in Rivers, Akwa-Ibom, Edo, Delta Cross River await after Bayelsa state operations.
“We further warn that henceforth, any attack on Ijaw communities or person(s) by the military or para-military bodies in the region, we will not hesitate to order our shoot-at-sight squad of any uniformed personnel in the region.
“For the records, Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) are not in Delta state, we only go there to strike and return back safely to the struggle base, Bayelsa state “, the group said.
The Niger Delta Avengers, the new face of violent agitations in the oil-rich region, on Wednesday accused the federal government of opening negotiations with people they described as fraudsters on ways of ending the current crisis in the area.
It was obviously responding to a comment in the media on the activities of the group by the Senior Special Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Media and Publicity, Mr Garba Shehu, that the group had no clear demands.
“My conversation on this issue with General Babagana Munguno, the National Security Adviser, precisely two weeks back, he informed this reporter that he met 14 groups claiming leadership to the renewed onslaught on the nation’s economic jugular vein.
“Each of the groups had been brought to him by a serving governor or a former one; a serving minister or one that had left office with assurances that “this group is the one to talk to.”
“The amazing discovery he made from his meetings is the lack of unity among them as each group that came attacked the one that came before it as inconsequential”, Shehu had written.
But in a release by the spokesman of the group, Mudock Agbinibo, on Wednesday, the group denied ever meeting with any contact committee from the federal government, insisting that those being negotiated with were out to swindle the government.
“We, the Niger Delta Avengers, have not negotiated with anyone. So we don’t know where Mr Garba shehu and General Babagana Munguno, the National Security Adviser are getting their information from.
” If they have been negotiating with anybody, it clearly shows they had been negotiating with fraudsters and their (national security agency) created militant group”, the NDA stated.
The group which has been attacking oil and gas facilities in the Niger Delta since February this year, also dismissed assertions that its members were killing soldiers and raiding homes.
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