Nigerian soldiers burned hundreds of slum houses located close to the compound of an Italian oil company where at least one Italian worker was kidnapped and his bodyguard killed overnight.
Residents said the soldiers stormed the waterside settlement around the compound of Saipem, a unit of Italian oil giant ENI, poured petrol over the houses and set fire to them.
“I am surprised our own soldiers could do this to us,” said one resident, who gave his name only as James.
“They came here, poured petrol and set fire to our property and houses to kill us. What offence have we committed?”
At least two people, including one Italian oil worker, were kidnapped from a bar in the slum area on Thursday night. The gunmen who took them also shot and killed an army sergeant who was protecting them.
“The soldiers are asking why we let the militants in to kill their soldier,” said another resident, who declined to be named.
Families returned to the area around the Saipem compound on Friday morning, picking over the charred remains of their houses to recover personal items, but were chased away by soldiers brandishing bottles and throwing stones.
The reprisal comes after President Olusegun Obasanjo ordered the security services to use “force for force” against militants who have staged eight separate abductions this month alone.
In total at least 19 people have been kidnapped, but only three are still in captivity.
The trend has been encouraged by state governments and Western oil companies paying ransoms.
“The Rivers state government has been encouraging this by promptly paying large sums for their release,” said the militant Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, which has taken hostages but says it is opposed to kidnapping for ransom.
“Politicians are also using this as a platform to showcase their leverage amongst ‘militia groups’ in the delta. It’s now a booming trade.”
The string of kidnappings follows a series of crippling attacks on the oil industry in the world’s eighth largest exporter earlier this year by MEND, which is fighting for greater regional control over the region’s oil wealth.
One attempted hostage release went wrong on Sunday, when militants bringing a Nigerian employee of Royal Dutch Shell out of captivity ran into a military convoy, and a gunfight broke out.
At least ten militants were killed and MEND vowed on Thursday to avenge their deaths.
Oil companies fear that these killings, and the military’s heavy-handed crackdown, may signal a new escalation in the conflict in the vast wetlands region which pumps all of Nigeria’s oil.