PapaBrowne: Ok so these guys are paid like 50million dollars yearly. How is that a big deal? Or should they go back to the creeks? When they were in the creeks they were earning much more. Nigeria was producing just 700,000 barrels daily. Today we have added 2 million barrels to that. Because these guys are paid 50 million doillars yearly, we are now earning approximately 200 million dollars daily which is 70 billion dollars yearly.
My brother, it is only common sense to pay them. The FG doesn't have the capacity to manage another Niger Delta crises. The country will collapse in a second if that happens again. Trust me, this era is different from 2008. In 2008, we didn't have 18,000 as minimum wage neither did we have the Boko Haram scourge!
Anything to keep them off the creeks is just fine. Trust me that figure is way below the real figures. Over 1 Billion dollars is spent to keep them off the creeks. But it is worth every penny as we can see in our improved oil earnings!

sbeezy8:

Hypocrite

dayokanu: I hope in no time in the future would MEND return and say they are fighting for the Niger Delta marginalisation again

Super1759: An soo what? Even if they go home with one billon naira.
Federal gov and oil companies exploits their land with its natural resources and make the land useless with spillages. Beside as owners of the land, they should have lion share of the national cake.

sbeezy8:

Hypocrite

Oil thieves have hijacked political power - NNPC raises alarm •Says Nigeria loses 180,000 crude oil barrels to oil thieves daily


Written by Idowu Samuel
Friday, 25 May 2012
CRIMINALS and crude oil thieves have taken over the oil fields in the Niger Delta and have used the proceeds of oil theft to hijack political power in Nigeria, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), raised the alarm on Thursday.

The Executive Secretary of Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparent Initiative (NEITI), Mrs Zainab Ahmed, had earlier lamented the activities of the crude oil thieves in the creeks of Niger Delta, whose activities she said had denied Nigeria a whopping sum of $4.6 million in just two years.

The Group Managing Director of NNPC, Mr Austin Oniwon, lamented the increasing wave of criminal activities in the Niger Delta, which he said was causing Nigeria to lose an estimated 180,000 barrels of crude oil per day.

Ghana, he noted, required only 120,000 barrels of crude oil daily to survive, expressing dismay that the rate at which criminals were prospecting for crude oil illegally in the country had reached an alarming level.

Oniwon said the miscreants behind illegal oil bunkering in the zone had sponsored the election of local government chairmen and now have the capacity to sponsor and produce more state governors, adding that they even have the potential to fund the emergence of a Nigerian president in the future.

He dropped the hints when members of the House of Representatives Committee on Petroleum (Upstream), paid him a courtesy visit, as part of their oversight function, as he urged the lawmakers to enact legislation aimed at arresting the increasing wave of oil theft in Nigeria.

He said it was regrettable to note that criminals had taken over the most part of Niger Delta...” They have amassed so much wealth that they are beginning to look for political power. They have been sponsoring local government chairmen. The chairmen have also been sponsoring governors. And these people, if not checked in time, will one day produce the president of Nigeria.”

He said such a situation had occurred in countries like Colombia and Mexico where criminals dealing in drugs sponsored the presidents of the countries as a means of promoting their illegal trades.

Oniwon said Nigeria should waste no time in combating the nefarious activities of the oil thieves against the implication of its neighbours like Ghana, Liberia, Sierra Leone and The Gambia, which are now producing oil in commercial quantities, a development which may cripple the economy of Nigeria, anchored mainly on oil.

The NNPC boss urged the National Assembly not to delay in passing the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) which, he noted, was capable of curbing irregularities in the Nigerian oil sector, adding that the bill, if eventually passed into law had the capacity to promote the emergence of a strong national oil company.

The House Committee Chairman on Petroleum Resources (Upstream), Honourable Ajibola Muraina, who led members to the NNPC Towers, Abuja, equally lamented the growing capacity of crude oil thieves, as he urged the government of Nigeria to devise stringent means of preventing criminals from prospecting Nigeria’s crude oil illegally.

Muraina said the House of Representatives would work harmoniously with NNPC in sanitising the oil industry, even as he urged the corporation to, henceforth, begin to implement most of the recommendations by the House of Representatives and the Senate on the means of maintaining sanity in the Nigerian oil sector.

Demdem: Even if u are to pay them anything, the minimum wage/scale should be considered and be used. are these thugs any better than peace loving Niger delta civil servants that have given their best over the years. Surely, crime pays. That is the message the govt is trying to pass across.[b][/b]

HNosegbe: I CANNOT BELIEVE that someone is actually justifying this. Has it gotten so bad that we now justify every misstep of this government? How can we justify such blind diversion of our resources? Hasn't the government considered that if the plight of Niger Deltans had proactively been taken care of, the "legitimacy" of these criminals (because that is what they are) would have been removed?

Well if y'all won't, I'll call it what it is: LOOTING.

Gbawe:

Many Nigerian leaders obviously only respect killers and thugs. Empowering and capitulating to criminals, murderers and extremists is the trend today. Your guess is as good as mine as per where this approach will take Nigeria. Many case studies exists worldwide.

Demdem: These MEND foools told us they were fighting for the emancipation of the Niger-delta however recent events has revealed that they were indeed fighting for the emancipation of their pockets. Actually, nothing is wrong in fighting for ones pockets but when one remembers that innocent lives were lost in achieving these selfish desires of theirs, one is forced to call for justice on behalf of families that lost loved ones as a results of these foools acts.

The ND region still needs to be emancipated. The vast majority of the people are suffering and there hasnt been any real efforts by the govts to help them till date. Amnesty money is simply going to crooks. Amnesty to me is a fraud and its not in anyway solving the problems of the Niger-delta.

blink182: They never fought for anyone, it was always about their pockets. I know some of these people on a very personal level. To start with, it is cheaper to pay a few than actually emancipate the niger delta.

PapaBrowne: Ok so these guys are paid like 50million dollars yearly. How is that a big deal? Or should they go back to the creeks? When they were in the creeks they were earning much more. Nigeria was producing just 700,000 barrels daily. Today we have added 2 million barrels to that. Because these guys are paid 50 million doillars yearly, we are now earning approximately 200 million dollars daily which is 70 billion dollars yearly.
My brother, it is only common sense to pay them. The FG doesn't have the capacity to manage another Niger Delta crises. The country will collapse in a second if that happens again. Trust me, this era is different from 2008. In 2008, we didn't have 18,000 as minimum wage neither did we have the Boko Haram scourge!
Anything to keep them off the creeks is just fine. Trust me that figure is way below the real figures. Over 1 Billion dollars is spent to keep them off the creeks. But it is worth every penny as we can see in our improved oil earnings!