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Oil Theft: Tompolo Uncovers More 42 Tapping Points In Delta, Bayelsa

Published

2 years ago

October 9, 2022

…How Tantita, Security Operatives Discovered Breaches On Pipelines – Tompolo

…Oil Bunkers Angry; Send Threat Messages To Tompolo, Tantita Operatives

Ex-militant leader, Government Ekpemupolo, alias Tompolo, and security officials have uncovered 42 more tapping points by crude oil bunkers on the nation’s oil pipelines in two states – Delta and Bayelsa, bringing the total to 58, on Sunday.

The breakthrough came as bunkers, angry with the leader of the defunct Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, for exposing their unlawful business, in the past few weeks, sent him and operatives of Tantita Security Services Limited, TSSL, threat messages.

Tantita also, last Thursday, seized a vessel suspected to belong to an oil syndicate, which came to load crude oil from an undisclosed location in Delta State.

However, Tompolo, who spoke to reporters, on Sunday, at Oporoza, the traditional headquarters of Gbaramatu kingdom, Warri South-West local government area, Delta state, dismissed the threat by the oil bunkers.

At the time the Chief of Defense Staff, General Lucky Irabor, and the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited, NNPCL, Engr. Mele Kyari, visited Delta state, last Friday, Tantita reported the discovery of 16 tapping points on the trans-Forcados pipeline, which NNPCL had clamped.

Tompolo said, “As of today (Sunday), we have discovered over 58 points tapping points that oil bunkers have used in stealing crude oil from the nation’s pipelines in Delta and Bayelsa states.”

“In Delta, three major crude pipelines, including the trans-Escravos and Trans- Ramos lines have been tapped by oil bunkers.

“The tapping points that were traced on Friday were with the help of the Nigerian security, which was why inside the rain and everything, we could trace the lines

“We are doing the work together with the security agents; we are only providing intelligence for the security to assist to do the work. Therefore, everybody, NNPCL, and security agencies are working together in a very good spirit now.

“Now, the military has helped us to discover and stop the people from doing illegal activities, so we are going to work together and we do not want to go into details. The stealing had been going on for over eight to nine years,” he said.

On the threat messages to his boys, he asserted, “As for threat messages, that is normal, even this morning, they sent messages to me, but I think it is something we can handle.”

The ex-militant leader, who sounded optimistic they would soon curtail illegal oil bunkering, said, “With the way we are going now, we are getting cooperation from all the security agencies, both the ones in the state here and at the top. Therefore, by the grace of God, in no distant time, we will stop this largely.”

He said the company was not facing any major challenge, adding, “At a very point in time, we will always provide the intelligence and security people will come and do the work.”

On the barricading of creeks by oil bunkers with trees, he said: “That is the more reason we are involved, if we see any creek that is blocked with trees, we will bring in motor-saw people to cut it and we go inside.

“Where the security people cannot even go, we will first go there and ask them to follow because we cannot do anything with the security people. In addition, with the way all of them are actually cooperating, we will achieve the desired result.

“The communities are not posing a problem, it is the bunkers that offer resistance but even at that, like what I said before, this is our area, we are doing everything to ensure that we reduce oil bunkering to the barest minimum because the aquatic life in our area is almost gone.

“The crude oil that we recover from the creek, we are trying to get a barge where we will pump in the product, along the line, if any sink, we will not follow that because the terrain is bad. However, we will do everything within our power to stop further destruction and pollution,” he said.

Tompolo asserted: “There is no creek that anybody will pass in the region that I will not understand or the people working with me will not know. For now, we do not have any problem.

“Our major problem is the aquatic life of the people is gone and we are doing everything together with traditional rulers, security agencies, Department of State Services, DSS, and all that to ensure that we reduce it to the barest minimum so that our people can survive.”

Admitting that pipeline surveillance “is stressful,” he said there was no problem with the communities and he did not envisage that oil bunkers would not yield to his appeal to stop oil bunkering.

His words: “Before this time, I have been discussing with oil bunkers, whether from Rivers or Bayelsa, all over the place. Even many of them actually understand that oil bunkering is not a good thing for our environment.

“And that this the more reason we think there will not much problem for us to stop it, but their complaint is that there are no other means of survival.”

On the scarcity of kerosene, he said, “We are going to appeal to Federal Government and NNPCL to see what they can do about the local refinery, but you cannot fight illegality with illegality.”
VANGUARD

Related Topics:#Tompolo Bunkerers Oil theft

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UPDATED: Defence Chief, Nine Others Die In Kenya Military Helicopter Crash

Published

6 hours ago

April 18, 2024

Editor

A Kenyan military helicopter carrying top brass including the defence chief crashed on Thursday, police said.

President William Ruto convened an urgent meeting of the National Security Council, his office announced after news of the crash emerged.

Defence forces chief General Francis Omondi Ogolla was among those on board the helicopter that went down in Elgeyo Marakwet county, about 400 kilometres (250 miles) northwest of the capital Nairobi, a senior police officer told AFP.

“The helicopter burst into flames after crashing and it had more than 10 senior commanders on board including General Ogolla,” the officer said.

“They were in the area on a security mission because there are KDF (Kenya Defence Forces) soldiers deployed in the region,” he said.

Earlier, there was no report of official comment on casualties.

“President William Ruto has convened an urgent meeting of the National Security Council at State House Nairobi this evening following a Kenya Defence Forces’ helicopter crash this afternoon in Elgeyo-Marakwet County,” State House spokesman Hussein Mohamed said in a statement.

Ogolla, 61, was appointed Chief of the Defence Forces by Ruto in April last year after a stint as deputy.

Ruto told journalists last May that he appointed Ogolla despite him being among those who tried to overturn his narrow election win against opposition leader Raila Odinga in 2022.

“When I looked at his CV, he was the best person to be (a) general,” Ruto said, adding his decision went against the wishes of many people.

A trained fighter pilot, Ogolla joined the KDF in April 1984, rising through the ranks to command the Kenyan Air Force in 2018, a post he held for three years.

However, in a latest report, President Ruto said Ogolla and nine other senior military officers died in a helicopter crash on Thursday.

He added that only two survived the air accident.

“Today at 2:20 pm, our nation suffered a tragic air accident… I am deeply saddened to announce the passing on of General Francis Omondi Ogolla,” Ruto said.

AFP

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Heavy Floods in UAE, Afghanistan, Pakistan, 135 People Killed

Published

8 hours ago

April 18, 2024

Editor

Around 70 people have been killed by heavy rains lashing Afghanistan over the past five days, the government’s disaster management department said on Wednesday.

Neighbouring Pakistan has also been hammered by spring downpours, with 65 people killed in storm-related incidents as rain falls at nearly twice the historical average rate, officials told AFP.

Dubai’s flagship Emirates airline cancelled all check-ins on Wednesday as staff and passengers struggled to arrive and leave, with access roads flooded and some metro services suspended.

Afghanistan was parched by an unusually dry winter that desiccated the earth, exacerbating flash-flooding caused by spring downpours in most provinces.

Disaster management spokesman Janan Sayeq said “approximately 70 people lost their lives” as a result of rains between Saturday and Wednesday.

Fifty-six others have been injured, he added while more than 2,600 houses have been damaged or destroyed and 95,000 acres of farmland wiped away.

Giving a smaller death toll last week, Sayeq said most fatalities at that point had been caused by roof collapses resulting from the deluges.

The United Nations last year warned that “Afghanistan is experiencing major swings in extreme weather conditions”.

After four decades of war, the country ranks among the nations least prepared to face extreme weather events, which scientists say are becoming more frequent and severe due to climate change.

At least 25 people were killed in a landslide after massive snowfall in eastern Afghanistan in February, while around 60 were killed in a three-week spate of precipitation ending in March.

In Pakistan, heavy downpours between Friday and Monday unleashed flash floods and caused houses to collapse, while lightning killed at least 28 people.

The largest death toll was in northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where 32 people have died, including 15 children, and more than 1,300 homes have been damaged.

“All the casualties resulted from the collapse of walls and roofs,” the spokesman for the province’s disaster management authority, Anwar Khan, told AFP on Wednesday.

Dubai’s giant highways were clogged by flooding and airport passengers were urged to stay away on Wednesday as the glitzy financial centre reeled from record rains.

Huge tailbacks snaked along six-lane expressways after up to 254 millimetres of rain – about two years’ worth – fell on the desert United Arab Emirates on Tuesday.

At least one person was killed after a 70-year-old man was swept away in his car in Ras Al-Khaimah, one of the country’s seven emirates, police said.

Passengers were warned not to come to Dubai Airport, the world’s busiest by international traffic, “unless absolutely necessary,” an official said.

“Flights continue to be delayed and diverted… We are working hard to recover operations as quickly as possible in very challenging conditions,” a Dubai Airports spokesperson said.

Climatologist Friederike Otto, a specialist in assessing the role of climate change on extreme weather events, told AFP it was “highly likely” that global warming had worsened the storms.

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Germany Arrests Two Alleged Russian Spies

Published

9 hours ago

April 18, 2024

Editor

Two German-Russian men were arrested in Bavaria on suspicion of spying for Russia and planning blasts and arson attacks to undermine Berlin’s military support for Ukraine, German prosecutors said Thursday.

The pair, identified only as Dieter S. and Alexander J., were arrested in the city of Bayreuth in southeastern Germany on Wednesday, federal prosecutors said in a statement.

The main accused, Dieter S., is alleged to have scouted potential targets for attacks, “including facilities of the US armed forces” stationed in Germany.

Police officers also searched both men’s residences and workplaces on Wednesday.

They are suspected of “having been active for a foreign intelligence service” in what prosecutors described as a “particularly serious case” of espionage.

According to prosecutors, Dieter S. had been exchanging information with a person linked to Russian intelligence services since October 2023, discussing possible sabotage acts.

“The actions were intended, in particular, to undermine the military support provided from Germany to Ukraine against the Russian aggression,” prosecutors said.

The accused allegedly expressed readiness to “commit explosive and arson attacks mainly on military infrastructure and industrial sites in Germany”.

To this end, Dieter S. collected information about potential targets, “including facilities of the US armed forces”.

Fellow accused Alexander J. began assisting him in March 2024 at the latest, they added.

Dieter S. scouted some of the potential targets by taking photos and videos of military transport and equipment. He then allegedly shared the information with his contact person.

Dieter S. also faces a separate charge of belonging to a foreign terrorist organisation, as prosecutors strongly suspect he was a fighter of an armed unit of the so-called “People’s Republic of Donetsk” in eastern Ukraine in 2014-2016.

Germany has been shaken by several cases of alleged spying for Russia since the invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, amid suggestions that officials in Berlin are too sympathetic to Moscow.

A former German intelligence officer is currently on trial in Berlin, accused of handing information to Moscow that showed Germany had access to details of Russian mercenary operations in Ukraine. He denies the charges.

In November 2022, a German man was handed a suspended sentence for passing information to Russian intelligence services while working as a reserve officer for the German army.

AFP