Crossfire in Niger Delta’s swamps full of oil spills and intrigues

When Michael Peel, the West African Correspondent of the Financial Times, wrote ‘A Swamp Full of Dollars’, he focused on pipelines and paramilitaries at Nigeria’s oil frontier. Peel though he had seen much corruption and oil spill. The 2009 book was only four years older than the first gunshot by militants in the region (actually at the Marine Base in southern Port Harcourt at about 5pm that Sunday August 5, 2005).

Militancy was to escalate to all parts of the oil region and beyond to create a nation under the gun, a scenario that has been taken over by Boko Haram in North East, bandits in North West, Unknown gunmen in South-East, and sundry gunmen in Wester Nigeria, to this day.

The Niger Delta is now however touted as the most peaceful region in Nigeria after years and trillions of pacification fees through 13% oil derivation allocations, amnesty fund to ex-militants now called ex-agitators, pipeline protection contracts, and other sundry pacification palliatives.

At every turn, the funds and programmes or projects directed at the region have tended to create disputes and conflicts between rival or divergent groups. When the fallouts from Amnesty payouts seemed not enough to placate some former or subsisting warlords, the first major contract to protect oil assets was rolled out to Government Ekpemupolo, known as Tompolo, a man who held huge fear even to presidents and topmost indigenes of the Niger Delta. His company, Tantita Limited, is now saddled with the highest duty of keeping oil following.

Oil seems to have actually been flowing; from mere 900bpd at a point now to 1.8mbpd. This may have pushed the FG annual budget to as high as N68.32 trillion in 2026 from N4.5 trillion that President Muhammadu Buhari met in 2015.

This contract to Tantita has not only paid huge dividends to the FG in terms of oil revenues, it has also ensured that the youths of the Niger Delta cannot easily come together to levy war against the nation or against oil industry.

Instead, this has created hunger, if not envy from splinter groups in the Niger Delta who rather want a piece of the dollar, a piece of the action. They simply want oil asset protection contracts spread to most ex-agitator groups.

They see it as another right for agitating, but insiders say it is not exactly so. It is not another round of amnesty, they warn. ‘It is high stakes deal steeped in high-wire politics and deadly swampy business’.

It is believed that some of the sabotages and oil blowouts recorded in the oil region are handworks of some cells seeking recognition for protection jobs. It is also believed that some of the protection contractors want to have it alone and may be doing stuff against others to be seen by the FG as the real big boy to hold the biggest jobs.

So far, Pipeline Infrastructure Nigeria Limited (PINL) owned by a Warri group which protects pipelines and now assets in Rivers, Bayelsa, Imo, and Abia states, has been in frequent challenges with Tantita until truce was called. Groups in the Kalabari area are stirring for action, demanding for some protection jobs.

These underhand developments seemed to come to the open few weeks ago when Tantita Ltd made an eye-opening presentation at the National Assembly that used slides and aerial photos to show the extent of damage done in the oil region by oil thieves and vandals.

The presentation talked of presence of canals of crude oil delivering crude to dumps and a crude pond as large as five Olympic-size swimming pools.

What seemed to provoke intrigues however was the remark by Tantita that a protection contractor was found in a video at the location of oil sabotage.

This seemed to provoke those who felt the remark was meant to position Tantita as the only company with capacity and capability in the oil asset protection space.

Abili Integrated Services is a company protecting assets for Agip Oil, now Oando. The company has taken exception to the remarks by Tantita over an oil protection contractor seen in a video.

The company called a press conference in Port Harcourt on Monday, April 2o, 2026, at Le Meridian Hotel (Ogeyi Place) in New GRA to explain issues and assert the capability of Abili to carry on with asset protection jobs.

In what the managing director, Brown Edoghotu, called ‘Pipeline Security: The Truth Behind the Claims’, the CEO said it was reacting to claims by the Tantita Security at the National Assembly. He said they are security contractors in the Nigerian oil industry. “We were engaged in 2021 by NAOC (now Oando) to provide security for all oil assets operated by them in the land areas comprising 12 local government areas in Rivers, Bayelsa, Imo and Delta States.

“As you would recall, the Joint Committee on Petroleum Resources of the National Assembly held a Round Table on pipeline security on April 8, 2026. As was clear to everyone, Tantita went to extraordinary lengths to secure its position as the sole contractor for the pipeline surveillance contract.”

He said some of the submissions of Tantita were not totally true but made claims on its own competence, and failing to disclose the culpability of its officials in the continued vandalization of pipelines and theft of crude oil.

He said: “We are making this intervention today because our corporate integrity was falsely maligned during the presentation by officials of Tantita Security.

“Also, as stakeholders in the industry, we owe Nigerians a duty to the truth and the involvement of their officials in the intractable criminal acts of sabotage in the industry.”

On the facts, he said Tantita officials claimed that other contractors hired to protect pipelines sabotage those facilities. “They showed a video clip of a man at the site of a recent sabotage. The individual shown in that video is me. My presence at the scene after the incident was in the course of duty. The video was probably taken on September 22, 2022, just some days after Tantita Security commenced the contract awarded to them by the Federal Government. The incident referenced in the video happened at Oshika in Ahaoda west LGA on September 22, 2022. My team and I visited the scene on the same day.

“My presence at the scene was part of my responsibility to ensure immediate assessment and swift resolution, to prevent recurrence. I need to emphasise that I was on ground with my team, two representatives of the Nigeria Agip Oil Company, alongside the military personnel, men and officers of the Nigeria Police Force, and members of the Civil Defence Corps, deployed to support our operations.”

He rather revealed the persons believed to be behind the incident (or crime) and gave the names as Dim Yunifa Friday and his younger brother, Bestman Yunifa, Oscar Okpeni including Chibudum Bethel, who he claimed were not Abili workers.

He said: “When our ‘Quick Response Team’ (QRT) went after them to arrest them, they ran off to Warri in Delta State to hide. But not too long after, the long arm of the law caught up with them and we arrested and put them behind bars.

He said one of them is still at large. “Their records and pictures are with Nigeria Police and Oando plc. Should anyone deny these facts, we would release the videos.” He said they disclosed who they were working for, and it is not Abili Integrated.

He said the same people were responsible for the Ana/Anakpor illegal bunkering camp which Abili Integrated Services QRT (Quick Response Team) tracked and destroyed. “As a matter of fact, the former MD of NNPC, Mele Kyari, met our team right there on the scene while we were destroying the camp during one of his site visits.”

Edoghotu made a grave allegation, saying the other company engages miscreants and uses them to destroy oil facilities in the area of protection of other protection companies. “They vandalize the pipeline, take pictures and videos, and then run to the authorities and pose as the only solution to the problem they intentionally created for their pecuniary gains.

“You will never see their workers on patrol. We only see them whenever NNPC officials come for periodic inspections or when they want to carry out their evil acts of vandalizing the pipelines. After such inspections, they disappear. No organisation can go far with such criminal mindset.”

He went on: “The incident under review was a coordinated and deliberate action to rubbish and damage my integrity, then take my job. It is noteworthy that the then Central Corridor operator (Eni) appeared to recognise these dynamics and did not act in a manner that supported the alleged intent.

“Let me be clear: I am not opposed to any organization pursuing contract renewal. In fact, I support initiatives that create opportunities and empower Niger Delta communities. What I strongly oppose is the use of falsehoods, misrepresentation, and character attacks to achieve such goals. No organization should attempt to advance its interests by discrediting others. That approach is unethical, deceptive, unacceptable and criminal.”

Edoghotu challenged the figures released by Tantita thus: “More so, in the presentation, they claimed that they knew of a reservoir which is five times the size of an Olympic swimming pool. This is falsehood taken too far.

An Olympic size swimming pool will hold 16,000 barrels of oil. Five of them will hold 80,000 barrels, equivalent to 2.5 million litres. That is a footprint that cannot be missed. What happened to the reservoirs and where are the owners?”

It was at this point that Abili challenged the people who made the allegation to allow for independent verification of these claims by credible journalists and stakeholders by showing them such reservoirs because such does not exist in the area they (Abili) cover. “They should also prove that such reservoirs are old and have been there before the contract was awarded to them by the Federal Government.

“They also claimed the existence of canals and long-standing installations in my area of coverage predating their contract. These assertions must be substantiated with verifiable evidence. It is not enough to make baseless allegations. The impression was also created that my area of coverage is dotted with kilometres of canals where crude oil flows.

“We challenge them to prove this. When this video first came to my attention, I chose restraint. I believed silence would preserve professionalism and avoid unnecessary conflict within the Niger Delta. However, after consulting respected mutual friends, it became clear that setting the record straight is necessary—for the sake of transparency, accountability, and public trust.”

Abili said it formally sent written requests that Tantita Security retract the video and its misleading claims within 48 hours. “The deadline has since passed (Friday, April 17, 2026) without response. This press conference is therefore a necessary step.”

As a postscript, Edoghotu raised what he called critical questions for the public and investigative journalists: “If Tantita Security is as effective as portrayed, why do oil assets in the swamp areas such as Brass which is under their supervision continue to experience widespread losses? Why are operators in those regions reportedly achieving less than 30 per cent of production capacity?

“Why are there still widespread losses in the central corridor of Escravos under the direct control of Tantita Security? These are simple and straight forward questions that require simple answers.

“In contrast, in part of the land areas under our company’s responsibility, productivity (production) consistently reaches up to 96% of installed capacity. These are not claims—they are verifiable operational results.”

The MD said, “We do not cover all the land areas, only a portion of it. At Abili Integrated Services Limited, we stand by integrity, performance, and accountability. We believe that results—not rhetoric—should determine credibility.”

Conclusion:

There seems to be need for elders of the oil region to open consultations with all the oil asset protection contractors to lay their own rules of engagement to avoid acrimony and violence.

As Edoghotu suggested, let all players play by the rule and eschew bitterness because those whose tools include guns must never allow themselves to be drawn in intra- and inter-group violent confrontations.