Pipelines Surveillance Contract: Oiling the Niger Delta Conflict

Currently, Nigeria is faced with the stark reality of the existential threat. As the country battles insurgency in the North-East, banditry in the North-West, farmer-herder conflict in the North-Central, and separatist agitations in the South-East and South-West, the phenomenon of crude oil theft has assumed unprecedented dimension in the South-South. Apart from Abia and Imo states in the South-East and Ondo in the South-West, the remaining six oil-producing states in the country are in the South-South geopolitical zone. The nine oil-producing states are critical to the political economy of Nigeria because of the enormous oil revenues generated from them. However, in the mid-1990s to late 2000s, a revolt against the federal government and oil companies in the Niger Delta region reduced oil production from two million to 700,000 barrels (Aghedo, 2013).

The deployment of state military power against the Niger Delta militants could not secure peace amid structural violence in the region (Nwokolo, 2017). Hence President Yar’Adua had to grant amnesty to the fighters in 2009 to obviate the costly threat to oil production in the volatile region (Idemudia, 2017). However, despite the amnesty programme, oil theft has continued at an alarming rate in the region. While there are different accounts of the volume of oil stolen every month, the industry regulator, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), confirms that the country loses about 470,000 BPD of crude oil, amounting to $700 million monthly as a result of oil theft.

The Nigerian government has contracted pipeline protection to non-state actors in response to this haemorrhage. The latest award of a ₦48 billion-a-year contract to the former warlord of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), Government Ekpemupolo alias Tompolo, has generated both applause and opposition. This edition of Nextier SPD Policy Weekly examines the efficacy and challenges of pipeline surveillance contracts in Nigeria.

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