- Halted Forcados oil pipeline showed signs of external damage
- Troops will guard oil installations in the Niger Delta region
Nigeria is deploying more troops to protect oil installations to curb
sabotage after a leak forced crude loadings to be suspended last month
at a major export terminal.
“We’ve observed that some internal
forces are bent on sabotaging the activities of the oil production
companies,” Brigadier-General Rabe Abubakar, Nigeria Defence spokesman,
said in interview in Abuja, Nigeria. “We are taking extra steps to
ensure that we guard these facilities” including pipelines, oil
platforms and other installations, he said.
Loading at the
Forcados oil terminal, where Nigeria shipped around 200,000 barrels a
day last year, was halted after the leak appeared on Feb. 14, according
to Royal Dutch Shell Plc. While the company stopped short of calling it
an act of sabotage, it said damage observed on the export pipeline was
“consistent with the application of external force.”
Shell
hasn’t said when it will lift the force majeure -- a legal status
protecting a party from liability if it can’t fulfill a contract for
reasons beyond its control -- on Forcados shipments.
Criminal Gangs
Nigeria,
Africa’s biggest oil producer, loses an estimated 300,000 barrels a day
to criminal gangs that tap crude from pipelines that criss-cross the
oil-rich southern delta, using it in local refineries or selling it to
tankers waiting offshore, according to state-owned Nigerian National
Petroleum Corp. The country pumped 1.9 million barrels a day last year
on average, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
“We have a
large task force that can contain any aggression,” Abubakar said. “We
have enough troops and other security agencies that can face the
challenge of the times.”
The move to protect energy installations
follows complaints on Feb. 29 from Shoreline Natural Resources Ltd., the
third biggest non-international Nigerian oil and gas producer. Chief
Executive Officer Kola Karim urged the deployment of troops to the Delta
region following the suspension of crude loadings at Forcados.
“We’re
faced with the devil on all fronts,” Karim said. “Prices are awfully
low, our export terminal has been attacked and we can’t export even if
we produce.”
No comments:
Post a Comment