Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Nigeria's Crude Oil Theft: Shell Et'al And Their Half Truths?


Nigex
14 June 2011

Nigeria's Crude Oil Theft: Shell Et'al And Their Half Truths?
Ifeanyi Izeze

Even the federal government knows and had publicly acknowledged that Nigeria on daily basis loses huge volumes of its produced crude oil to thieves thriving unhindered across the nation’s coast lines especially in the Niger Delta and Lagos areas. However, recent declaration by Nigeria’s biggest foreign operator in the oil and gas industry, Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC) in its 2010 briefing that the nation has continued to lose billions of dollars through significant volumes of the country’s crude oil production lost to thieves that thrive in illegal export of the commodity smacked of insincerity on the side of the foreign operating oil companies.

Federal Government’s deliberate indifference to tackle the problem which out rightly falls within the purview of financial crime and crime against humanity as it imparts indirectly on the lives of the already battered Nigerian masses also called to question its sincerity and our seriousness as a nation. The story: Massive stealing of crude oil from producing companies’ facilities especially flow-lines in the onshore and near-shore Niger Delta has increased despite reduction in violence by militants in the area.

Apart from losing volumes of produced oil and condensate valued at several millions of dollars on daily basis, the activities of the thieves leave the production facilities of these oil companies in constant state of disrepair thereby incurring huge maintenance cost on the NNPC joint venture partners.

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