TheCable

Alhaji Asari Dokubo, the retired but not tired Niger Delta freedom fighter, recently paid a courtesy visit to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the Presidential Villa in Abuja, the nation’s capital. He was one of the numerous notable people who have paid the newly sworn-in president a courtesy visit. It (the visit) was expected to come and go, like a dozen others before it, but the ever-combative Dokubo would have none of that as he sat before the camera to address newsmen after meeting with the president to talk about what most Nigerians already know but are afraid of discussing in the open, for fear of being visited with the state’s instrument of violence. This is talking about an organised crime of economic sabotage (oil theft) against the Nigerian state and those who are allegedly responsible for it.

The Niger Delta “freedom fighter” said: “The military is at the centre of oil theft, and we have to make this very clear to the Nigerian public that 99% of oil theft can be traced to the Nigerian military, the Army and the Navy especially”.

He went further to say: “The army and the navy intimidate the civil defence (NSCDC) who are by status, the people who are supposed to guard these pipelines. They receive a lot of money from NNPCL and the IOCs and just across the corner, you will see a houseboat; a few meters from the houseboat, you will see an oil bunkering refinery or tapping directly from oil well ends. It is very pathetic now. What is happening in the Niger Delta in the past eight years was unprecedented in the history of oil production anywhere in the world. The vandals do not only attack the pipelines, but they have also migrated from the pipeline, and have gone directly to the oil well heads, and they take directly from the oil well heads. They set up haphazard facilities they call local refineries and artisanal refineries. This is a crime against humanity because the livelihood of the people is being totally destroyed”. These are his words.

Those were the allegations by the ex-militant-turned “statesman”, against two of the most important security agencies in the country. The allegations are, in every sense, weighty because they border on economic sabotage. But flippant as the accusation may sound, it is difficult not to believe that some elements in the security circle are not aware, or part, of the syndicate. This is because the sheer size of the tankers is not something that even a blind man would fail to notice in the creek, let alone, security agents. I do not know how much those vessels, with a capacity for hundreds of tonnes of crude oil, could be hidden from the consortium of security agents in the creek while the crime goes on. So, I do not believe the military does not possess the technology to detect such a humongous facility (belonging to the economic saboteurs) in the creek.

To set the record straight, oil theft is one phenomenon to which the federal government has been losing revenues running into dozens of billions of dollars over the past years. It is one organised crime in which the security agency – the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), that is purpose-built to tackle it and other crimes associated with the oil and gas industry is most often rendered ineffectual, due to the level of sophistication of the thieves’ weapons, connections in high places, and operational strategies. For years now, Nigeria has not been able to meet her Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) quota. This is, largely, due to the act of economic sabotage called oil theft. It should, therefore, be of utmost concern to any right-thinking Nigerian. But that should not be a license for anyone to assault the integrity of the military as an institution the way Dokubo did. If anyone (including Dokubo) has any credible intelligence for the military regarding misconduct by any of its personnel, there are more appropriate ways to channel such, than taking advantage of access to or presence in Aso Rock to play to the gallery.

Oil theft and the culprits are issues that have, so far, been limited to being discussed in hushed tones in and around beer parlours and gossip centres across the country. It is believed that if some of the high-ranking security personnel deployed to the creek are not the thieves then they would, at least, be accomplices to the crime. But nobody dares say it in the open – in the traditional or new media for fear of being invited to shed more light on the allegation. This is because every right-thinking person knows that the fraction of the men of the security agencies that would be involved in that illicit act would be too infinitesimal for all the personnel to be defined by their acts. It is, therefore, very rash and unconscionable for somebody of Dokubo’s standing to have rubbished the institutions of the Nigerian Army and its naval counterparts with such an allegation, especially when you do not have any evidence on a particular suspect caught in the act.

A vast majority of these gallant compatriots of ours (the military) have sacrificed (and are still sacrificing) far too much to protect the territorial integrity of this country to be so rubbished. They, most often, put their lives on the line for us to feel safe in our country. They stay awake so that the rest of us can sleep with both eyes closed.

Please do not get me wrong, for I am not saying Dokubo’s claims are totally untrue but I think it is unfair on the majority of them (the military men) who are always upholding the ethical standards of their profession, in the discharge of their duties, for the Kalabari chief to accuse the entire military as an institution of being behind 99% of oil theft in Nigeria.

From the Lake Chad region, the forests of Zamfara, Kebbi, Niger, Kaduna, Katsina and Sokoto states to the creeks of the Niger Delta, their sacrifices are neither unnoticed nor unappreciated. I read in the news the responses of both the Nigerian Army and the Nigerian Navy asking him to name names. I, personally, do not appreciate (the two military outfits bantering words with him) asking him to name anyone he might have caught in the act. Rather, I think it would be better if they focus on strengthening their own in-built mechanism for self-cleansing and flushing out the bad eggs among them who can do anything for money. Their community relation unit should equally be strengthened to boost the confidence of the people to want to supply them with credible intelligence.

I won’t go without saying that it is very disingenuous of Asari Dokubo to have come out to say things he might not be able to substantiate and, in the process, drag in the mud the reputation of one of the few remaining national institutions that stands as a symbol of national unity and demonstration of patriotism. This is considering the fact that he is also a community leader in the oil-rich Niger Delta. We were all witnesses to when he was also against the federal government before he decided to lay down his arms and embrace the amnesty programme of the federal government, initiated by the Yar’Adua administration, after causing countless damage to oil installations that cost the government billions of dollars. Remember, the amnesty has enriched quite a number of those militants, including the whistle-blower-in-chief — Asari Dokubo, and it is still sustained up to this moment by the federal government.

I agree it is their ancestral land which is a terrain he knows inside out; he is not expected to turn blind eyes to what is going on in the region, especially now that he is born again. But I think it will be unbecoming of a community leader like Dokubo to paint the entire personnel of an institution, like the military, with the same brush knowing fully well that it is inevitable for there to be a few bad eggs among the men, whose criminal act can never and should never be taken as being representative of the entire personnel.

Meanwhile, interrogating the little element of credence in Dokubo’s claim, it would be difficult for the Nigerian Army and the Nigerian Navy to claim that they do not see the vessels with which the crime is being committed. A vessel with a capacity to siphon as much as thousands of barrels of crude oil at once would be too massive to go unspotted. Again, as alleged by Dokubo, why are they getting in the way of the NSCDC in the discharge of their statutory duties which is not in any way obstructing theirs?

While Dokubo might not be totally right or wrong, I do not also think the military (not as an institution) is totally guilty or innocent of the allegations. The very few unscrupulous elements within the top brass, and the rank and file, who drag the military into the mess need to be apprehended and made to face the law. It is, therefore, a piece of advice for them to ignore the person of the messenger that has failed to apply discretion and take the message, and focus on flushing out the few bad eggs among them, to safeguard the noble and patriotic image of the military.

By and large, between Asari Dokubo and the military, nobody is innocent or guilty. In other words, they are both innocent and guilty. That situation behoves the President, and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, to take decisive action on remedying the situation especially now that he has appointed a new set of service chiefs unless he wants to pretend oil theft is not happening.

Abubakar writes from Ilorin, Kwara state. He can be reached via 08051388285 or [email protected]