News
NSCDC Parades 10 Oil Thieves, Impounds Nine Cars In Rivers
Published
2 years agoon
By
Editor
…Seizes wooden boat, 28,225 litres of diesel
The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps said it took delivery of 10 suspects allegedly involved in illegal oil bunkering and vandalism in Kryo Community near Alakiri waterways in Okrika Local Government Area of Rivers State.
The Corps said of the ten suspects, five were arrested by the 29 Battalion Nigerian Army, Port Harcourt with 44 metal pipes, four cylinders, and exhibits and handed over to the Rivers State Command of the NSCDC Command in Port Harcourt
The other five suspects were arrested for alleged illegal bunkering by soldiers of the 6 Division Nigerian Army, Port Harcourt, and handed over to the NSCDC for further investigation.
The NSCDC Commandant, Rivers State Command, Basil Igwebueze disclosed this while parading the suspects before newsmen at the Command’s Headquarters in Port Harcourt on Tuesday.
READ ALSO: Nigeria Lost N2.3tn Revenue To Oil Theft in 12 Months — IOC
Igwebueze, also disclosed that NSCDC operatives on routine patrol impounded nine vehicles abandoned by suspects who are on the Command’s trail along the Trans-Amadi axis of Port Harcourt.
He stated, “The following five suspects: Aniebiet Pascal, 22, Nnadi Ogbonna, 23, Ifeayin Delight, 25, Sunday Benjamin, 22, and Okechukwu Finbar, 20, were apprehended by 29 Battalion Nigerian Army port Harcourt with 44 metal pipes, four Cylinders containing Nitrogen Gas, one wooden boat with 25 horsepower engine along Kryo Community near Alakiri waterways in Okrika Local Government Area of Rivers State.
“In another development, five other suspects were also arrested with three Motorcycles, two Wheelbarrows filled with Automotive Gas Oil (Diesel), and a 1,000-meter large Industrial Pumping Hose.
“They were arrested and handed over to NSCDC Rivers State Command by 6 military intelligence Headquarters, 6 Division Nigerian Army, Port Harcourt for further investigation and possible prosecution.”
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Continuing, Igwebueze said, “The Antivandal Unit of the Command while on routine patrol at Mother Cat roundabout, Trans Amadi in Port Harcourt also impounded the following vehicles being abandoned by suspects who are currently being trailed by our undercover personnel.”
He listed the vehicles as ‘a Gold Colour Toyota Camry with number plate Rivers AJ 770 DBU laden with illegally refined AGO concealed in cellophane bags, a White and Black Futon Bus Registered as EBONYI XA 637BKL laden with 8 plastic drums of illegally refined AGO. ‘
The State NSCDC boss also said while on routine patrol its Antivandal Unit further impounded seven cars, including, a Gold Colour Toyota Avalon Camry with registration number ABIA 573 RA, a light Green Toyota Camry LAGOS LND 926 AP.
Others, Igwebueze, disclosed are, ‘a Black Toyota Avalon Camry LAGOS EKY 487 DA, an Ash colour Toyota Corolla with number plate RIVERS GGU 240 AA, a Toyota Avalon Camry LAGOS APP 330 DE, a Navy Blue Toyota Avalon Camry Car with registration number AKWA IBOM KET 62 AV, a Navy Blue Toyota Avalon Camry Car Lagos AKD 938 AV.
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According to him, all the cars were laden with illegally refined Diesel concealed in cellophane bags.
He added, “We also impounded 15 drums of AGO, 26 concealed sacks filled with AGO, and 11 Kegs (25 litres each) of Automotive Gas Oil (AGO).”
While noting that a thorough investigation has commenced, the State NSCDC helmsman said the suspects would be charged to Court, while the products and means of conveyance would be forfeited and proceeds remitted into the federal government coffer.
The PUNCH reports that Igwebueze warned those he described as ‘unrepentant’ illegal oil thieves to turn over a new leaf or be ready to face the full wrath of the law.
Igwebueze reiterated the corps’ willingness to collaborate with sister security agencies, stressing that the NSCDC would not rest on its laurels in safeguarding all critical national assets and Infrastructures in the state.
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By Suyi Ayodele
Rome’s history offers timeless lessons for all nations to jealously guard their freedom. Consider one of its emperors, Caligula: Born Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, he reigned from AD 37 to AD 41. Known as Little Boots, Caligula’s four-year reign epitomised tyranny.
Albert Camus captured his ruthlessness in his 1938 play “Caligula”, while Stephen Dando-Collins’ 2019 book, “Caligula: The Mad Emperor of Rome”, and Kate Zusmann’s article, “Roman Emperor Caligula: The Mad Tyrant of Rome”, give vivid portraits of his excesses.
Zusmann wrote: “Caligula’s reign lasted only four years, but his cruel and unpredictable behavior earned him a reputation as one of the most notorious emperors in Roman history… He engaged in construction projects to emphasize his power and divine status. He humiliated senators by forcing them into menial tasks or public spectacles.”
Though he initially presented himself as a noble leader, he soon became Rome’s worst emperor. He wielded taxation and reckless spending as weapons of control.
One account records: “Caligula squandered 2.7 billion sesterces in his first year and addressed the deficit by confiscating estates, levying fines, and even imposing the death penalty to seize wealth. He crippled the Roman Senate in the process.”
Freed from opposition, he built an extravagant bridge at Baiae and introduced crippling taxes on everything, taverns, artisans, slaves, food, litigation, weddings, even prostitutes and their pimps. Taxes doubled in just four years, leaving ordinary Romans broken and resentful.
Is this not eerily familiar? In some places in Nigeria today, task force agents harass even mourners transporting corpses. They must pay the State.
Caligula’s Rome is a warning. When opposition disappears, tyranny grows unchecked, and taxation becomes limitless. Nigeria is already on that path.
Read this report: “It was gathered that governors on the shopping list of the APC include the Enugu State governor, Peter Ndubuisi Mbah, Bayelsa State governor, Douye Diri, Plateau State governor, Caleb Muftwang and the Zamfara State governor, Alhaji Dauda Lawal.”
That was how the Nigerian Tribune concluded its lead story on page five of its Monday, August 25, 2025, edition, titled: “Tension grips PDP leaders as APC targets more govs.” Two riders followed: “South-East, South-South, North-Central govs on shopping list” and “Tinubu to receive another PDP gov on arrival.”
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An average student of Nigeria’s political history should be deeply troubled by this report. The concern is not just the well-known fact that Nigeria’s political elite rarely show fidelity to principles, loyalty, or decency, but rather the imminent danger this trend poses to the survival of democracy and to the ordinary masses.
We must ask ourselves: what awaits the common man if Nigeria slides into a one-party state? Can the current wielder of power – the architect of this emerging no-opposition order – truly manage such a system? If today, under the pretense of multiparty democracy, impunity has already reached its peak, what happens when there is no one left to challenge those in power?
History warns us that we are about to repeat our mistakes. Nigeria has a peculiar habit of forgetting her sordid past. Some call it resilience; I disagree. What we parade as resilience is actually a battered psyche. Nigerians have been beaten into submission by those who weaponized poverty. With crumbs thrown here and there, leaders get away with political robbery. We have been conquered.
The sages warned us that thunder must not be allowed to strike twice in the same place. Their reasoning was simple: if bad history repeats itself, its second coming will be catastrophic – so tragic that no one will have the words to describe it.
That Nigeria is gradually sliding into a one-party state should raise an alarm. Euphemism has no place here. A one-party Nigeria under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is an invitation to disaster. The consequences will not stop with the opposition; even those within the president’s inner circle will eventually taste the venom. Tyrants spare no one—not even their favourites. We are headed down that perilous road.
Make no mistake: a one-party state will kill this democracy. It has happened before—not once, but twice. Some of us lived through it, others read about it. Nigeria lost two republics because those in power chose tyranny and crushed opposition.
The First Republic collapsed when the ruling Northern People’s Congress (NPC) attempted to monopolise political power. It formed alliances, coerced defections, and silenced dissent. Opposition leaders were detained on trumped-up charges. Resistance sparked the violent Operation Wetie in Western Nigeria in 1962. By January 15, 1966, the First Republic was dead.
What followed were the January and July 1966 coups, and then a 30-month civil war that consumed over two million lives. Yet we learnt nothing. When the chance came again in 1979, we squandered it.
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By mid-1982, the ruling National Party of Nigeria (NPN) had perfected its plan to decimate opposition. It swallowed the PRP in Kano and Kaduna, captured the NPP in old Anambra, and went after the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN). Oyo and Bendel fell to its onslaught, while only Ondo resisted—and that resistance produced bloodshed. By December 1983, the Second Republic collapsed, swept away by the military coup of Major-General Muhammadu Buhari. For the next 16 years, Nigeria was under the jackboot.
Whichever way we spin it, the truth is clear: the destruction of opposition in both the First and Second Republics laid the foundation for their collapse.
Those who defend the current defections as freedom of association miss the point. We are not disputing that right. What we warn against is the danger of acquiescing while political and economic power concentrate in the hands of one man. As Aesop warned: “Those who voluntarily put power into the hands of a tyrant must not wonder if it be at last turned against themselves.”
Those who think they can collaborate with the ruling party, pledging loyalty in opposition but serving power in secret, should think again. When tyranny consumes a nation, no one is spared. As the proverb goes, when heaven falls, it falls on everyone; the rain has no enemy.
Caligula reigned until his own guards turned on him. Tyranny and rebellion are monozygotic twins. Let today’s plotters of a one-party Nigeria take note.
Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, in “How Democracies Die” (2018), explain it best: democracies rarely collapse through external invasion. They are destroyed from within, through the slow erosion of norms and the ambitions of authoritarian leaders. Nigeria is walking that path again.
Chude Jideonwo and Adebola Williams, in How to Win Elections in Africa (2017), observe that political parties in Nigeria are not built on coherent ideology but on opportunism. The APC, they argue, never stood on any deep philosophy; it merely capitalized on the weaknesses of the PDP. That explains why even serving PDP governors are defecting in droves to join it. But what exactly is the attraction? To answer that, let us revisit one of our old moonlight tales.
Long ago, when animals behaved like humans, Ikún, the deaf squirrel, desired to live as long as mortals. It went to a diviner to seek the Oracle’s blessing.
The divination was swift and stern: for Ikún to live long, it must avoid anything sweet that came from the enemy.
Ikún protested. Why should it shun sweet things when everyone knew it delighted in them?
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The Oracle replied with finality: What is sweet kills faster than anything else.
Ikún left, troubled. It wondered who its enemy could be. The only one that came to mind was the groundnut farmer, whose produce it relished. Resolving to obey the warning, Ikún avoided the groundnut farm.
The farmer soon noticed that Ikún no longer raided his crops. Suspicious, he tried several tricks. He attempted to smoke Ikún out of its burrow, but failed—for as elders say, òrò burúkú kii ká ikún mó’lé (misfortune never meets the squirrel at home). He tried hunting it at night, but that too failed—for ikún kii jé l’óru (the squirrel never ventures out at night).
At last, the farmer set a trap, using ripe banana as bait. The fruit was carefully placed over the blade, waiting to spring at the slightest tug.
Not long after, Ikún wandered by and spotted the banana. Overjoyed, it rushed forward. Banana was a delicacy, and its sweetness irresistible. Ikún took a bite, wagged its tail, and forgot all about the Oracle’s warning. It bit again, wagged its tail, and then tried to carry the whole banana away.
In a flash, the trap snapped. Ikún was caught between the jaws of death. Too late, it realised the truth: the sweet gift from the enemy was a lure to destruction. With its dying breath, it remembered the Oracle’s words.
Our elders, who preserved this tale, summed it up in the saying: ikun ńjẹ ògèdè, ikún ńrè’dí; ikún ò mọ̀ pé ohun tó dùn mà únpa ènìyàn (the squirrel wags its tail while eating banana, not knowing that what is sweet is what kills a man).
And that, precisely, is what the defecting governors are doing today. The banana from the ruling APC is sweet, but beneath its sweetness lies a deadly trap.
News
PHOTOS: Brazil Welcomes Tinubu With Full Military Honours In Brasília
Published
15 hours agoon
August 25, 2025By
Editor
Brazil on Monday rolled out full military honours at the Planalto Palace in Brasília to receive President Bola Tinubu.
Tinubu’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, disclosed this on X on Monday.
READ ALSO:Tinubu Signs Direct Flight, Other Agreements With Brazil
Onanuga said Tinubu was welcomed by his host, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Onanuga said Tinubu was welcomed by his host, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
He wrote, “More photos of the official reception for President Tinubu at the Planalto Palace in Brasília, Monday, August 25, 2025. Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva welcomed President Bola Tinubu with full military honours.”
News
Tinubu Signs Direct Flight, Other Agreements With Brazil
Published
15 hours agoon
August 25, 2025By
Editor
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has signed a landmark Bilateral Air Service Agreement with Brazil, signalling the establishment of direct air links between Nigeria and South America’s largest economy.
The agreement was formalised on Monday during Tinubu’s official state visit to Brasília.
Media aide to the minister, Tunde Moshood, made this known through a statement, made available to The PUNCH.
At the signing ceremony which was witnessed by Messrs Nigerian President, Tinubu and the Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Brasilia also had the Nigeria’s Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, signed the agreement on behalf of Nigeria, while Brazil’s Minister of Transport, Silvio Costa Filho, also signed for the host country.
READ ALSO:2027: You Will Lose 80% Of Northern Muslim Votes If…, APC Forum Warns Tinubu
The BASA creates a new framework for direct flights between Nigeria and Brazil, with the potential to significantly enhance trade, tourism, investment, and diplomatic relations.
The statement further noted that, “ It also marks a key step in Nigeria’s broader efforts to strengthen international partnerships and improve global connectivity.”
Tinubu had arrived in Brazil with a delegation that included Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun; Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Bianca Ojukwu; Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Abubakar Kyari; and other senior government officials.
According to the statement, the Brazilian President welcomed the agreement, expressing his administration’s commitment to expanding cooperation with Nigeria in sectors such as aviation, agriculture, and infrastructure.
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He described the BASA as a reflection of the strong ties between both countries and an opportunity to deepen economic and cultural collaboration.
Tinubu is also scheduled to hold meetings with key Brazilian government officials, including the President of the Senate, the President of the Chamber of Deputies, and the President of the Supreme Federal Court.
The two-day visit will include high-level discussions between Nigerian and Brazilian delegations across various sectors, as both nations explore opportunities for mutual growth and development.
The statement reads, “The ongoing state visit will also see President Tinubu meeting the President of the Brazilian Senate at the National Congress, the President of the Chamber of Deputies, and the President of the Supreme Federal Court.
“The working visit, which continues tomorrow, will also feature high-level engagements between Nigerian and Brazilian delegations across various sectors, underscoring both nations’ commitment to building a future of mutual growth and prosperity.”
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