An illegal oil bunkering vessel that had been detained with stolen crude oil aboard in the Escravos area of Delta State was set ablaze last night by members of the Nigerian Navy and Tantita Security Services, a business run by Chief Government Ekpemupolo popularly called Tompolo
Seven crew members from the ship were detained last Thursday in close proximity to Escravos in the Warri South West Local Government Area of the state.
The yacht with the registration number L85 B9.50 was allegedly carrying between 600 and 650 cubic metres of illegally lifted crude oil in five compartments at the time of the arrest.
Around 3 o’clock, Tantita Security Services employees and members of the Nigerian Navy burned the unfortunate vessel ablaze in front of journalists.
Captain Warredi Enisuoh, a Marine intelligence consultant working for Tantita Security Services, revealed that the arrest was the result of intelligence gathering and that his security officers had “monitored the space through satellite.”
Records, he claimed, revealed that the detained Dutch vessel, which had been sold to a Nigerian, had been “used for transferring crude oil illegally for years,” and that she had been planned to transport stolen cargo to Tema in Ghana.
Enisuoh expressed happiness that “the operation of Tantita Security Services in coordination with Operation Delta Safe, which is a joint effort between the public and private sectors, has achieved excellent results leading to the arrest.”
The Operational Head of Tantita Security Services Limited, Chief Ebipade Kari, who oversaw the operation, announced the vessel’s capture on Sunday before her destruction yesterday. He said that the interception was made after they received a tip-off.
“We got a tip off that a ship was loading at the Escravos axis. The Tantita security personnel went to the place and got the ship arrested.
“While I insisted that the crew must be taken to Oporoza in Gbaramatu Kingdom, where Tantita operational office is located. Their boss was begging me through the captain of the ship to offer me a bribe of N25m which he promised to deliver in dollars, so that I can let the ship go. But I turned down the offer,” he added.
The Group Chief Executive Officer (GCEO) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), Melee Kyari, has been urged by oil and gas host communities in the Niger Delta to end oil theft, identify and bring to justice those responsible, or step down.
Communities bemoaned the nation’s once-again pitiful state as a result of rising oil theft, which was reflected in the nation’s high corruption rating.
In a statement released yesterday, Joseph Ambakederimo, the chairman of the Board of Trustees of Community Development Communities of Niger Delta Oil and Gas Producing Areas, said that Kyari resigned from his job as a result of the exposure of the four-kilometre-long oil pipe theft.
He regretted that the revelation coming out from the oil and gas sector, the mainstay of the nation’s economy, had once again brought to the fore a country blighted with unimaginable level of corruption that is not abating.
