PETROLEUM and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN), the umbrella body for the nation�s influential senior oil workers, threatened yesterday to pull out all its members from the Niger Delta region, following Sunday�s gun battle between the Joint Military Task Force (JMTF) and militant youths which might have claimed the life of Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) worker, Comrade Nelson Ujeya and 10 militants.
Fear of reprisals has already heightened tension in the troubled Ekeremor creeks of Bayelsa State following the Sunday�s clash.
Addressing journalists in Lagos, President of PENGASSAN, Comrade Peter Esele, said the entire Niger Delta region was no longer safe and vowed that the association would hold Bayelsa State government responsible for whatever happened to Comrade Ujeya.
He expressed disgust that Comrade Ujeya who was alleged to have been taken hostage by youths of Letugbene community since August 8, 2006, when he accompanied Bayelsa State government Joint Investigation Visit (JIV) to Letugbene community had actually been released to the Task Force on the fateful day before the Joint Task Force engaged the militants in a gun duel.
Comrade Esele accused the Federal Government of double standard in dealing with the issue of hostages, wondering why President Olusegun Obasanjo would give a matching order to JMTF to shoot militants on sight after securing the release of a foreign oil worker.
He said the leadership of the two unions in the oil and gas industry, PENGASSAN and the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG), under the aegis of NUPENGASSAN would meet next week to take a stand on the Niger Delta crisis, amongst others.
Visibly angry, the President of PENGASSAN said the oil workers had come to the conclusion that the nation�s security agencies had no capacity to guarantee the lives of innocent people in the region, especially workers and, therefore, had lost confidence in them.
Comrade Esele said while the association abhorred the violence and militancy going on in the region, the oil workers felt government had not done enough to find a lasting solution to the lingering problems.
Tension in N-Delta
Fear of reprisal attack has heightened in the troubled Ekeremor creeks of Bayelsa State following the killing of 10 militants including a staff of the Anglo-Dutch giant, Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) by men of the Joint Military Task Force, a.k.a. Operation Restore Hope.
The slain youths, sources told Vanguard, were returning from Letugbene where they had gone to secure the release of a Shell Petroleum Development Company, SPDC staff that had been held hostage for two weeks by some community youths when they were ambushed by the soldiers who opened fire on them.
Although the Bayelsa State government is yet to comment on the incident, an impeccable source told Vanguard that the state governor, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan yesterday held an emergency meeting with top government officials over the accident.
Unconfirmed reports yesterday said there was a fresh skirmish in the creeks between the soldiers and militants. The militants were said to have been angered by the unprovoked attack of the military which led to the death of the rescue party that ventured to the creeks to secure the release of the abducted oil worker.
It was gathered that most riverine commuters are now avoiding the Ekeremor creeks in the night for fear of being caught in cross fire because of the ugly incident blamed on poor communication between the company and the military operatives.