ABOUT 16 militants were feared killed on Wednesday night when they launched a surprise attack on security gunboats around the Bonny River in Rivers State.
It was gathered that the soldiers of the Joint Task Force (JTF) repelled the attack, sank two of the six boats the militants used to launch the attack. Each boat was said to have carried eight militants inside.
Nigerian Tribune gathered that the militants launched an unprovoked attack on the Joint Task Force (JTF) Operation Flush Out 3 gunboats at about 7.15 p.m.
The tide, however, turned against the insurgents, who were suspected to have launched the offensive with the aim of stealing military arms and ammunition, when security forces responded and sank two of their boats with the occupants on board.
According to a message from the spokesman for the JTF, Lieutenant Colonel Sagir Musa, no soldier was lost in the attack. He, however, said that a soldier was wounded in the attack but was already responding to treatment.
“Militants in six speedboats attacked our gunboats on their location on Bonny River at about 0715 p.m. today. The intention was likely to surprise our troops, capture arms, ammunition and, if possible, snatch our gunboat.
“The attack was repelled; two militant speedboats were sunk with all the occupants on board. No JTF arms/ammunition or gunboat was lost.
“A JTF officer was, however, wounded and is in stable condition. This message is to pre-empt unnecessary propaganda and magnification of the situation. The situation is under control and security forces are on top and in control,” Musa said in his statement.
After the battle, the JTF, according to Colonel Musa, was able to recover some arms and ammunition from the militants.
“One GPMG, one AK47 rifle, one submachine gun, assorted ammunition, mostly 7.62mm, and some quantity of dynamites were recovered from the militants,” Musa added.
Meanwhile, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), has denied knowledge of Wednesday’s attack.
In a response sent by the group’s spokesman, Jomo Gbomo, he simply said: “We did not carry out the attack.”
In another development, the Nigerian Customs Service, assisted by men of the Nigerian Army and a team of police officers, has arrested about 52 suspected smugglers, as a new onslaught to crack down on the operations of contraband smugglers in the Lagos- Seme border axis began.
The new onslaught followed Tuesday’s declaration of war by smugglers on men of the Customs service, during which one customs officer was killed and five others wounded, after which the smugglers fled with two busloads of expensive textile materials.
Eyewitnesses told the Nigerian Tribune that the smugglers had arrived at the Agbara Customs checkpoint in high spirits, negotiated as usual, and made what they felt was a commensurate settlement, which, however, an officer allegedly maintained was too low.
The smugglers, it was further learnt, though actually upped their bribe, the officer still insisted that the market value of the materials was far higher than the money they were offering. This, according to the eyewitnesses, infuriated one of the smugglers who barked out an order to his colleagues, and one of them smashed a heavy iron rod on an officer’s head, as the rest made a mincemeat of the other customs officers.
“My brother, this one baffled everybody. One minute, they were all chatting and smiling. And the next minute, it was all hell let loose. We ran like we would never run again when we saw brains splashed on the road, and blood pumping out like somebody just broke a pipe!” one of the eyewitnesses stated.
Nigerian Customs Service spokesman, Chief Superintendent Wale Adeniyi, however, denied that the customs officers at the checkpoint ever attempted to compromise with the smugglers.
While confirming the incident and the death of an officer, he stressed that the service was leaving no stone unturned in its bid to bring all connected with the dastardly act to book.
“We have arrested 52 hoodlums so far in connection with the incident; and they are all helping the service to unravel those involved in the act. We have spread out the dragnet, and we have also involved the army and men of the Nigerian Police,” he said.