Oil Thieves Are Authorized By Fed Govt – Chief Nduese Essien
The Evangelist
October 27, 2022
By Assam ABIA
A former Minister of Lands, Housing and Urban Development and a two term member of the House of Representatives, Chief Nduese Essien has found the Federal Government complicit in the business of oil theft in Nigeria.
Speaking with newsmen recently on the nagging issue of Oil theft, the Elder Statesman said,
“We know that the Federal Government bought equipment used in monitoring oil leakage, spillage or stealing. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited, NNPCL, bought the same equipment used in Saudi Arabia in 2003, they installed it but have not put it to use, so they are complicit”
“In Saudi Arabia, not even one barrel of oil escapes, either from the pipelines or from the loading point”,
“That equipment also monitors all the ships going out or coming into Saudi Arabia. In addition, it spots wherever oil is leaking, stolen, or whatever happens to the oil pipelines, secondly, the Managing Director of NNPCL said that there was an illegal installation of a 4 km pipeline into the sea operating for nine years”,
“So they know where the stealing had been occurring because it is impossible for someone to install a 4km pipeline from the coast into
the Atlantic Ocean with none of the security agencies or NNPCL noticing it, he said, adding that,
“They carried out oil stealing in connivance with the owners of oil wells, workers in the oil industry, and the security agencies that are supposed to be monitoring and guarding the installation”.
“I am saying this because, in 1999, I was in the House of Representatives as a member of the Petroleum Committee. We went on oversight function and got to know that the NNPC did not have meters for monitoring the quantity of oil produced or the shipment”,.
Speaking further, he said that the Committee found out that International Oil Companies, IOCs, usually hosted the
Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR, officials to monitor production and shipment, they would wait for the report as brought to them by the IOCs.
“We then recommended that a monitoring equipment be procured as obtainable in all oil producing countries in the world, which the Federal Government did in 2003 but after installation, has refused to use it”,
“Therefore, if it is now that they want to stop stealing, they should make use of the equipment”, Chief Essien said.
“They only raised the alarm now because the theft has seriously affected the revenue accruing to the Federation Account.”
The former federal lawmaker called on the Federal Government to withdraw the authority given to the thieves, arrest them, recover losses and prosecute them.
