Reuters) — Nigerian militants who have sabotaged oil facilities and kidnapped workers in the southern Niger Delta said on Tuesday they would stage a series of attacks in the next few days to show oil companies their power.
In an e-mail statement, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, which is holding four foreign hostages, also threatened to use more aggressive tactics against oil workers and their families in the vast wetlands region from February 1.
“In the next few days we will carry out a series of attacks to prove to all companies that we alone, your hosts, can guarantee your security,” the statement said.
“Our operations will shift from the creeks into the cities where we will grind the Nigerian economy to a halt,” it added.
The militants called on oil workers to leave the delta, which pumps almost all of Nigeria’s 2.4 million barrels a day of oil.
The four foreign oil worker hostages held by the group spoke to Reuters by telephone on their sixth day in captivity on Monday, listing their captors’ demands and warning the military against any attempted intervention or rescue. (Full story)
The four — an American, a Briton, a Bulgarian and a Honduran — said they were being treated well, but that their living conditions were not comfortable.
On behalf of his captors, the Briton delivered a 48-hour ultimatum to the Nigerian government to accede to their demands and called for negotiations.
In Tuesday’s statement, the group said: “With effect from February 1 2006 we will commence more aggressive tactics aimed at oil company workers and their families in the Niger Delta.”
Oil workers evacuated
Royal Dutch Shell evacuated about 330 workers from four oil flow stations after the latest attack on Sunday, and is considering more withdrawals amid uncertainty over where the militants will strike next, a senior oil industry official said.
Two attacks last Wednesday hit Nigeria’s oil output by 226,000 barrels a day, or 10 percent, and this production is still shut almost a week later.
The militants are fighting for local control of the Niger Delta’s oil wealth, demand that Shell pay the local government $1.5 billion in compensation for pollution, and wants the release of three men including two ethnic Ijaw leaders, according to the demands read by the British hostage.
Analysts say the violence is also part of growing regional rivalry in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, ahead of presidential elections in 2007.
Mujahid Dokubo-Asari, one of the Ijaw leaders whose release was included in the kidnappers’ demands, appeared on Tuesday in an Abuja court, where he faces treason charges.
He launched a blistering verbal attack on President Olusegun Obasanjo. “Obasanjo is a dictator and will pay for the crime he is committing against the people of this country,” he said.
“Obasanjo is a murderer, a thief, a man who is stealing the resources of this country,” the militant said. “He thought he could suppress the Ijaw people. The war is just beginning.”
The possibility of further staff evacuations by Shell, Nigeria’s largest producer, raises the prospect of deeper output cuts and will increase pressure on Obasanjo to crack down on the militants.
He held a high-level security meeting with delta governors and military officials in Abuja on Tuesday morning.
Poverty and wealth
Violence against oil workers is frequent in the Niger Delta, which accounts for almost all of Nigeria’s 2.4 million barrels a day output and where an estimated 20 million people live in poverty alongside a multibillion-dollar industry.
Ruled by military dictators for most of its history since independence from Britain in 1960, Nigeria returned to civilian government in 1999, but ethnic militia and organized thuggery remain a feature of political life.
Much of the rhetoric of militant Niger Delta groups is echoed by regional politicians, who have demanded a greater share of the oil wealth and the right to pick the ruling party candidate for elections in 2007.
The militants’ threat to broaden their attacks helped drive up oil prices for a second day running, combining with worries about Iran’s nuclear program to push London Brent crude prices up by 72 cents to $63.90 a barrel.