• 'Some JTF soldiers extort, harass innocent citizens',
• Politicians, foreign oil companies aid militants,
• For destroying illegal bunkering, militants declared Oil War, JTF
• Details of the FG, militants’ secret talks

Air Marshal Paul Dike

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Chief of Defence Staff, (CDS), Air Marshal Paul Dike has expressed concern that secret military information meant for the Joint Task Force (JTF) fighting militancy in the Niger Delta region is leaked before it gets to the soldiers.

The CDS also has information that some soldiers attached to the JTF encourage illegal bunkering in the area. He has also been informed of extortions and harassment of the people in the area by the soldiers.

Dike made this revelation during his visit to the Niger Delta, last week.

The CDS, who addressed men of the JTF in Effurun, Delta state, said he was worried at how information meant for the JTF get leaked to the militants before they reach their destinations.

Thursday, last week, Dike toured the strife-wracked Niger Delta where militants launched an “oil war”. He said he was in the region, hit over the past five days by some of the worst attacks on oil installations in recent years of insurgency, to see how the military was handling the unrest.

Five years ago, the government created and deployed a special military unit, the Joint Task Force (JTF), to combat the rebellion by local armed militants claiming to be fighting for a greater share of the oil revenue in the Niger Delta.

Dike said he embarked on the mission to assess the performance of the JTF, adding that “I am pleased to say that I am very satisfied with what I have seen, although there are a couple of areas we have to work on,” Dike said at the end of a tour he conducted secretly.

Dike however told the soldiers that: “We have gotten reports about harassment by men of the JTF. We have gotten reports about extortion by men of the JTF. The mandate you have here is to protect lives and property.

If in an attempt to discharging that duty, you start harassing men, children and women, you lose your respect. For sometimes now, the Nigerian military and the police have lost some little bit of their respect because of the way we behave. We are determined to put things straight. No amount of sacrifice that you put in here will mean anything if you don’t have self respect. For any well trained soldier to be focused, you must be disciplined. If you lack discipline, you cannot achieve anything.

“I am a bit worried also, about the way information leaks out to people who should not get to know about the content of the message. Everything again boils down to discipline. We pass messages from Abuja , before it will get to where it ought to get to, the message is already leaked. Is it that some of us here are informants, or some of us lack the requisite discipline to wear this uniform? We need to work hard to get the respect that the Nigerian military used to have because anything you do here, if you lack discipline, it is zero.

“There are suggestions in certain quarters too, that some of you in one form or the other encourage bunkering. I don’t want to believe that some of you participate in it. If you do gentlemen, your days are numbered. It is unheard of that men of a disciplined force will involve themselves in economic sabotage, because if you are involved in bunkering, it is nothing short of economic sabotage. That is why I am saying do not spoil the good work that you are doing here”.

However, details of the federal and Niger Delta militants secret talks have started to filter to the public. The federal government met with leaders of the three major Niger Delta militants: Movement for Emancipation of the Niger-Delta ( MEND)’s General Boyloaf, Comrade Ateke Tom of the Niger-Delta Volunteer Vigilante, Mr. Farah and other warlords.

The meeting, held from Monday through Wednesday this week at the Presidential villa, Abuja, came barely 24 hours after a unilateral cease-fire on the “oil war”, christened Hurricane Barborossa was secured from MEND through the instrumentality of Ijaw leader, Chief Edwin Clark,, Chief Government Ekpemupolo and chairman of the Federal Government Committee on Peace and Conflict Resolution, Senator David Brigidi

In their demands to the federal government, Saturday Vanguard learnt that the militants asked that the JTF should cease further attacks on communities in the region and that the task force should be withdrawn.

The militants also asked for the creation of oil commissions by the Bayelsa and Rivers state governments. In these commissions, the oil producing communities will manage 50 per cent of the 13 per cent derivation funds accruing to the state.

Another issue the groups discussed was the appointment of the Minister of Niger-Delta as well as a general amnesty for all Niger-Delta militants as there was speculation that the government wanted to pardon only selected persons.

However, JTF has accused the Niger Delta militants of launching the oil war because the JTF destroyed their illegal bunkering. Men of the JTF last July destroyed 111 illegal refineries at Tuomo community in Burutu Local Government Area of Delta state. Coordinator of the JTF Media Centre, Lt Col. Rabe Abubakar, said the illegal refineries were locally fabricated, and that it could be likened to the distillation system used for the production of alcohol.

He added that the local refineries were made of drums, pipe hose, big tripods, cooling system where the product is separated and fire wood with which drums filled with crude oil are heated to boiling point before the products are released into the cooling system. The structure hosting the facilities is small in size. There are over 300 of such illegal refineries in Bayelsa and Delta states, the soldier said, adding that each of them costs about N1m to build.

MEND, through its spokesman, Jomo Gbomo, last September 14, declared what it called Oil War in the Niger Delta.

“We have declared an oil war in response to the unprovoked aerial and marine attacks on our positions by the armed forces of Nigeria. We are asking that oil companies evacuate their staff from their field facilities because the brief is not to capture hostages but to bring these structures to the ground.”

However, one of the militants that met the Vice President, Goodluck Jonathan, told Saturday Vanguard that the federal government begged them to cease fire, and that VP’s hands are tied concerning withdrawing the JTF as well as unconditional release of Okah.

The VP, he went on, alluded that the requests would be met gradually by the government if there is peace in the region. “You know he is not the President; he made us to understand that he would convey demands to Mr. President on whose table the buck stops,”, he told Saturday Vanguard.

But the JTF has accused top politicians and oil companies of aiding the militants. The task force members made these accusations when Dike visited Rivers state on the spot assessment of security situations in the Niger Delta.

Commanding officer of the Naval base in Port Harcourt, Navy Captain Okojie of the Nigerian Navy had told the CDS that on the day militants attacked a Navy patrol boat and the counter attack from the Navy which lasted about an hour, one of the militants who later jumped into the water was overheard phoning frantically on his GSM, reporting how they were being over powered by the Navy in the shootout that resulted in one of the boats being sunk.

Moments after the phone call and while the shootout was still going on, calls from top politicians including some from Abuja, the federal capital, bombarding Navy Captain Okojie and the JTF Commander, with the Pathfinder Commander being threatened of dire consequences if he did not stop repelling the militants, Okogie said.

Dike later proceeded to the headquarters’ of ‘Operation Restore Hope’ at Effurun, Delta State where after he was briefed by the JTF Commander, Brig-General Nanven Rintip, he addressed the troops. Dike while addressing the JTF men accused some of them of lack of discipline. Some of them he said, connive with militants to steal oil. They also leak military secrets sent from Abuja, as well as their molestations of the innocent civilians.

Saturday Vanguard gathered that in Abuja, Clark was the peace broker and after the preliminary meeting with him last Monday, the emissaries went into top secret meeting with the Vice President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan on Tuesday night to notify him of the conditions for peace in the region by the militants.

Though the outcome of the meeting is yet to be made open, one of the militant leaders told Saturday Vanguard that , “The Vice President asked seriously that the militants should cease fire and that the Presidency would address the demands gradually, but, he said he did not have the power to grant our requests.

“The way I see it, he is like telling us that his hands are tied in some of the requests like withdrawing the JTF, unconditional release of Okah and all that. But he alluded that they would be met gradually by the government if there is peace in the region. You know he is not the President; he made us understand that he would convey demands to Mr. President on whose table the buck stops.

He charged us to go back and tell those that sent us to embrace peace and we ended the meeting on that note”, he explained.