Indications have emerged that the Federal Government’s rebuff of pleas to stop further military onslaught against militants in the Niger Delta communities may have been caused by negative intelligence reports on some leaders of the region.
A security source said that some prominent leaders in the region, including state governors, had been found to be fraternising with militant groups before the ongoing operation.
He said the indicted leaders had lost the respect of the Presidency and could not be taken serious in the ongoing campaign.
The source said it would be unwise to accept input from persons who had openly fraternised and offered monetary inducements to leaders of known militant groups in the region.
He added that that the failure of some governors and leaders of the region to contain the excesses of the armed groups had also drawn the ire of the Federal Government.
He said, “How can you listen to people you know have openly identified with known militants in the Niger Delta region? Today, they have lost control of the boys and there is nothing they can do about it.
“The truth is that if the ongoing campaign is suspended, the criminals will regroup and visit the nation with the worst assault. Some of those shouting on top of their voices and condemning the operation are being watched because their hands are not clean.”
Another source said the matter was being controlled by the Defence Headquarters, adding that the ongoing campaign would not stop until all the militants’ camps in the region were smashed.
He noted that with the killing of soldiers by the militants last week in what the source described as a brazen affront against the Federal Government, “the insurgents had taken the matter too far.”
The source said, “We take direct instructions from Defence Headquarters and we are going to carry out our mandate in the region. We don’t take instructions from any governor.”
But in continuation of the campaign, the Joint Task Force said it had recovered a large cache of military hardware from Okerenkoko and Oporoza communities in Delta State .
The Coordinator of the Joint Media Campaign Centre of the task force, Col. Rabe Abubakar, disclosed this on Wednesday.
Abubakar listed some of the items recovered during operations in the two communities to include anti-aircraft guns, general purpose machine guns, rocket propelled grenades and locally-made guns, machetes and charms.
He said the items were taken by artillery corps soldiers, who were moved into the area on a search-and-rescue mission, adding that no jet fighter was deployed for the operation as being speculated.