The Nigerian Navy, on Tuesday met with a wide range of stakeholders in the maritime sector over continued crude oil theft, particularly in the Niger-Delta region of the country.
The stakeholders, including industry regulators, maritime law enforcement as well as industry players, during the meeting bemoaned incessant pipeline vandalism, sea piracy coupled with other challenges contributing to revenue loss.
The meeting was attended by some traditional rulers, officials from Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited (NNPCL), Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), Commanders of military formations, other security agencies and many critical stakeholders.
The meeting was coming on the heels of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s directives to the military to ensure that crude oil thieves are dealt with in order to increase production of the products and supply it to Dangote refinery in naira.
Speaking at the commencement of the meeting, Chief of Naval Staff, Vice Admiral Emmanuel Ogalla, disclosed that establishment of Operation Delta Safe has led to the arrest of not less than 35 ships with stolen crude.
Ogalla said those arrested had been handed over to the prosecuting agency, adding that there is a need for effective collaboration in order to tackle the menace headlong.
“Accordingly, this forum seeks to address emerging security issues arising from implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act, contemporary trends in maritime security as well as other law enforcement issues which border on maritime and energy security,” he said.
He assured Nigerians of the Navy’s commitment to the fulfilment of its statutory roles in order to emplace a conducive maritime domain for economic prosperity of our nation.
He said Navy was working to ensure that its operations do not constitute obstacles to the operators but rather contribute to them being able to perform their duties and produce optimally.
Ogalla added, “The Nigerian Navy has sustained her maritime security operations through surveillance, response capability and law enforcement in addition to collaboration with all maritime stakeholders.
“We rejigged our operations and established OPERATION DELTA SANITY in Jan 24. This operation has achieved remarkable successes in curbing oil theft. Over 35 ships involved in oil theft have been arrested and handed over to appropriate prosecuting agencies.
“So, provision of security is part of ways of increasing promoting ease of doing business, because if there is no security, the operators cannot operate. Also ensuring that our arrests and detentions do not impede on the legitimate business operators, we ensure that when we make arrests, we quickly carry our preliminary investigation.
“And if I it was based on wrong information, we quickly release those vessels so that we do not impede businesses. So generally that is our own contribution. The way we feel that we can promote ease of doing business by ensuring that our operations, our patrols, do not end up constituting problems to the operators.
“Rather, we should support them by giving them the assurance and the confidence that they are well protected from the criminal elements who are always keen towards disrupting businesses in Nigeria.”
On his part, the Group Managing Director of Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, Mele Kyari, said the country now records 1.6m barrels of crude production daily.
Kyari, who was represented by the Managing Director, Pipeline NNPCL, Folorunsho Karim, stated that with the support of the Nigerian Navy and other relevant stakeholders, crude production will reach the targeted 2mbpd by year end.
He said, “The target is to increase production to 2 million barrels by the end of the year, and we are fully committed in doing that. I appreciated the effort and the support of Nigeria Navy for making this possible, because without them we won’t be able to achieve this.
“So, they have been giving us a lot of support and we’re having a reduction in oil theft. And the pipeline vandalism has also decreased significantly and a lot presently going on in the industry right now. And we hope that we will sustain this. We’ll be able to achieve our target of 2 million barrels per day toward the end of the year.”