Making good their threat, militant Ijaw youths yesterday, claimed they attacked another oil facility and blew up a military vessel in a sustained onslaught on the oil industry.
The claim came as oil giants, Shell announced the shut down of its Western operations even as dwindling output from Nigeria pushed crude oil prices up by over a dollar to close at $61.15 per barrel in the export market.
Ijaw militants, under the aegis of Movement for the Emancipatin of the Niger Delta (MEND) had Sunday threatened to fire rockets at oil tankers to press home their demand for the control of the oil wealth in the region.
But the Commander of the Joint Task Force (JTF) in the Niger Delta, Brig. Gen. Elias Zamani said he was not aware of any fresh attacks by MEND.
He spoke in a telephone interview with Daily Champion from his Warri, Detla State operational base.
Minister of State for Petroleum, Dr. Edmund Daukoru, was said to be out of the country when we tried to reach him but his media aide told our correspondent on phone that the ministry was yet to receive any official report on the latest incidents.
Joint Military Task Force (JTF), with Presidential Mandate to protect oil interests in the region, also said it was not aware of any fresh attacks by MEND.
MEND which claimed responsibility for damaging oil installations and taking nine hostages on Saturday insisted it carried out the attack on Monday.
In an email to Reuters the militant said “patrol units carried out attacks on one houseboat belonging to the Nigerian army and the Shell Ughelli Odidi-Escravos manifold. Both were destroyed with explosives.”
Soldiers on the houseboat however reportedly fled before it was destroyed.
It was not immediately possible to independently confirm the information as the commander of the JTF, Brigadier-General Elias Zamani declined comment.
The militants have however in the past provided accurate details of their attacks.
Shell stopped 455,000 barrels a day oil production, 19 per cent of Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) member’s output, after a string of pre-dawn raids on installations in the Niger Delta Saturday.
The oil firm closed its 340,000 barrels a day from fields feeding its Forcados tanker platform, and halted another 115,000 barrels daily.
MEND said “we are going to continue with the destruction of oil facilities in Delta State while concluding arrangements for our wider attacks on the entire region.”
North Sea Brent crude oil futures rose by $1.65 to $61.54 a barrel in response to the crisis.
It would be recalled that the militants snatched the hostage – three Americans, a Briton, two Egyptians, two Thais and one Filipino – from a barge operated by U. S. services company Willbros.
The government said the movement is a cover for thieves siphoning crude oil on commercial scale from pipelines across the delta