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6 February, 2006
After meeting with the government last week, ICEM oil union affiliates NUPENG and PENGASSAN have given a two-week deadline to improve security in the Niger Delta, or strike plans will start.
On 30 January, four kidnapped subcontractors of Shell were released, after 19 days, but further acts of violence by youth and other heavily-armed groups in the oil-rich delta continue. Two weeks ago a group attacked the offices of Italian-based Eni’s Agip Mgboshimini base in Port Harcourt. Two banks there also were attacked. Eleven were killed, including police officers, and several others were injured. Following the raids and killings, Eni pulled all its workers from the city.
On 28 January, 20 gunmen stormed Daewoo Engineering & Construction Co. and got away with US$300,000 in cash. Crime-prone groups threaten all foreign-owned oil and support companies, and even target tanker-truck drivers.
The unions have called for an end to the reckless lawlessness, and call on the government to come up with meaningful solutions to alleviate poverty in the Niger Delta.
NUPENG President Peter Akpatason said current governmental agencies are not fulfilling their proper roles, which is to create jobs for young people. “Any attempt at solving the crisis in the region, the level of degradation, the level of poverty without thinking how to create jobs…will not achieve anything,” he told the publication Vanguard. “However, we condemn in its entirety the idea of attacking oil facilities and most especially workers.”