MILITANT BILLIONAIRES - A MUST READ

Militant billionaires

.. TUESDAY'S THE NATION NEWSPAPERS' EDITORIAL

•Ex-warlords are now security chiefs in Nigeria’s oil industry!

THE recent revelation that the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) is paying about N5.6 billion annually to former leaders of Niger Delta militant groups to secure its pipelines is another unwelcome reminder of the Jonathan administration’s penchant for throwing money at problems instead of solving them.

The American newspaper, the Wall Street Journal, claims that the NNPC has a schedule of regular payments to several ex-militant leaders running into millions of dollars. Government Ekpumopolo, alias “Tompolo,” is paid U.S. $22 million a year; Mujahhid Dokubo-Asari gets about U.S $9 million; Ebikabowei “Boyloaf” Victor Ben and Ateke Tom annually receive $3.8 million each. According to the newspaper, the ex-militant leaders are paid to guard the NNPC’s pipelines which are vital to the evacuation of crude oil for export and the transportation of fuel products across the country.

Several questions immediately come to mind, many touching on the propriety of this arrangement. Is this a formal contractual agreement? If it is, where was the deal signed, and what are its terms? Why was an arrangement involving this amount of expenditure not disclosed to the relevant National Assembly committees overseeing the activities of the NNPC? Why was it kept secret from the Nigerian people? Were these ex-militant leaders not part of the government’s vaunted amnesty programme, on which it will be spending the equivalent of $450 million in 2012? 

The lack of transparency surrounding the whole affair is a virtual confirmation of its illegitimacy. Regardless of their nuisance value, neither Ekpumopolo nor Dokubo-Asari or any of the others is a trained security operative with a proven background in oil-facility security. Destroying pipelines and oil facilities is not the same thing as securing them; the demonstrated capacity to throttle the nation’s oil export capacity does not connote the ability to facilitate the unhampered flow of the product. The fact that the theft and illegal refining of petroleum products and attacks on oil facilities have actually increased in recent times is ample testimony to the failure of the ex-militants to justify their payments. 

The larger implications of the situation must also be considered, especially given the severe security challenges currently confronting the country. When a government decides to pay huge amounts to individuals who were involved in activities detrimental to the Nigerian state, they are encouraging others to do the same thing. Just as indigenes of the Niger Delta have legitimate grievances over resource control and environmental degradation, other nationalities have their own valid complaints. The Federal Government seems to be saying that organised violence is the best way to attract its attention and its finances. 

To make matters worse, these payments do little to resolve the issues that gave rise to the problem of militancy in the first place. The ex-militant warlords may be extremely well-off, but their extreme wealth stands in stark contrast to the overwhelming poverty and despair which assails the south-south as a whole. The millions of dollars the NNPC has chosen to bestow on a few individuals could have been used to accelerate the overall development of the sorely-deprived communities of the region. 

The pipeline-security payments constitute yet another of the Federal Government’s opaque dealings with former militant leaders. Earlier this year, it was discovered that contracts for securing the nation’s coastline were given to a company in which one of them had substantial interests. There was no public tender and no short-listing process; the terms of the contract are unknown. 

If the Jonathan administration wants to be taken seriously, it must refrain from acquiescing in actions like these which demonstrate such a profound poverty of thinking. Ex-militant leaders have a right to pursue a legitimate living in their country, but that does not mean that they should take part in the corruption that they once claimed to be fighting.