Leader of the Niger Delta Volunteer Force, Asari Dokubo, on Friday, volunteered to work with other groups to stop the massive oil theft going in the region, insisting that the theft is being perpetuated by Nigeria military cabals
Dokubo while speaking with State House journalists after meeting with President Bola Tinubu at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, said the people of the Niger Delta have now resolved to ensure a zero crude oil theft in the region.
The former militant leader argued that ordinary Niger Delta citizens who are often blamed for the action are not responsible as they do not have the wherewithal to perform the stealing.
According to him, there are “notorious” Army and Naval oil kingpins that have engaged in an unprecedented crude oil theft in the last eight years.
He assured that with President Tinubu, the military kingpins have met their match as they would be flushed out of the system.
According to him, the way the oil thieves have gone about their criminal activities has stripped the people of the Niger Delta of their livelihood, noting that it is a crime against humanity.
Dokubo also alleged that it is an act of blackmail for the military to say that they have insufficient armaments to deal with insecurity, accusing them of forfeiting their weapons to the insurgents, which continued to fuel the insurgency.
Dokubo’s allegations corroborates the observation of Steve Coll in his book ‘Private Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power’, published in may 2021.
Coll wrote about a deep rooted abetting of oil theft among key officials of Nigerian Navy discovered by the US Navy.
He wrote on page 472 of the book: ““From Europe, the U.S. Navy initiated the Africa Partnership Station, a program of periodic U.S. Navy patrols in the Gulf of Guinea, coupled with exercises and shore visits, that were designed to build up the Nigerian navy and the navies and coast guards of smaller neighboring countries. The program found traction in better-organized nations, such as Ghana, but its sponsors struggled in Abuja. The United States had “never really come across an organization that behaves” like the Nigerian navy, said a U.S. official involved. American military officers “come in here and they see a navy with all the trappings, the ranks, the uniforms, and so on, and they think it’s a real navy – poor but earnest. But it’s not that at all.” It was not obvious what policies the Americans could bring to bear on a sister service that was mainly a criminal enterprise dressed up in epaulets.
“It’s hard to get used to the fact that Nigerian officials will lie to you straight up,” the American official continued. “The chief of navy staff told us, “There has been no incidence of piracy. You have been misinformed.” In fact, American diplomatic and intelligence analysts documented nearly four hundred incidents of piracy in Nigerian waters between 2006 and 2009. ExxonMobil itself was struck in some seasons as often as three times per month. Arguably, the effect of American military assistance to the Nigerian navy had been to abet attacks on the property of America’s largest oil corporation.””
