JTF captures bunkering vessels, nabs 26

Click banner for more info

The Joint (Military) Task Force in the Niger Delta, code named Operation Pulo Shield, said on Sunday that it intercepted two bunkering vessels and arrested 26 suspected oil thieves, including a Ghanain, in the region.  According to the JTF spokesman, Lt.-Col. Onyema Nwachukwu, the feat was achieved after a week-long operations in Bayelsa, Rivers, Delta and Edo states.  He said the suspects were arrested over alleged illegal lifting of crude oil and illegally distilled Automated Gas Oil (diesel).  In Bayelsa State, Nwachukwu said troops of 343 Artillery Regiment deployed in the state’s creeks, uncovered a hose illegally connected from Nigerian Agip Oil Company’s pipeline to an illegal oil dump.

Continue after the break.

SEE How South Africans hijack $20billion Dollar ship bunkering business in Nigeria

Click banner for more info

The Nigerian Licensed Ship Chandlers Association a week ago took a swipe at the Directorate of Petroleum Resources DPR, apex regulatory organ of the downstream segment of the Nigerian petroleum industry over hitches connected with ship bunkering regulation in Nigeria, which gives South African firms a benefit over their Nigerian counterparts.

Secretary Board of Trustees of the association, Dr. Emeka Enebeli, who spoke in an interview, disclosed that the bunkering business in Nigeria is worthover $20bn, but regretted this segment of the maritime industry has become an exclusive preserved for South African firms.

In accordance with him, till date, no Nigerian individual or corporate has a ship bunkering license, saying that the stringent conditions listed by the DPR makes it almost impossible for almost any Nigerian individual or corporate has a bunkering license.