Money and oil at root of delta violence, rights group says

Ethnic loathing may have been the spur to the ferocious violence between rival ethnic militias in Nigeria’s Niger Delta this year, but the object was control of government resources and money from stolen crude oil, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Wednesday. “Although the violence has both ethnic and political dimensions, it is essentially a fight over the oil money, both government revenue and the profits of stolen crude,” said Bronwen Manby, deputy director of HRW’s Africa Division and the author of the 29-page report entitled “The Warri Crisis: Fuelling Violence.” The report details fighting around the southern oil town of Warri involving rival militias of the Ijaw, Itsekiri and Urhobo ethnic groups. It said the conflict, which began in 1997, had killed hundreds of people this year and left thousands displaced. Both Ijaws and Urhobos allege their Itsekiri rivals are favoured by government in the distribution of election constituency boundaries and oil benefits. The international human rights group urged the Nigerian federal government to provide more honest and accountable administration in Delta State of which Warri is the capital. It also called on President Olusegun Obasanjo to crack down on the theft of oil from pipelines, saying the massive profits from this illegal trade had been used to flood the region with guns. “Efforts to halt the violence and end the civilian suffering that has accompanied it must...include steps both to improve government accountability and to end the theft of oil,” Manby said. HRW specifically called for a re-run of this year's general elections in Delta State, saying the levels of fraud and violence which accompanied voting meant minimum international standards for an acceptable election were not met. The group also recommended that Nigeria adopt a system of “certifying” legally obtained crude oil by using chemical processes to identify cargoes of stolen crude in the international market. Several oil company executives have said this would discourage the powerful gangs which siphon off up to 10 percent of Nigeria's oil production and ship it out by barge to tankers waiting offshore in an illegal trade known as "bunkering." HRW recalled that some of the worst fighting in the delta occurred during the general elections in April and May this year. The conflict drew in government troops and forced oil companies operating in the area to temporarily close 40 percent of Nigeria’s oil production of about two million barrels per day. According to the rights group, being in government in Nigeria affords individuals unhindered control over state resources. With Delta State, the centre of the violence, accounting for 40 percent of Nigeria's oil production and being constitutionally entitled to 13 percent of the oil revenue, the elections were fought with violence and fraud with eyes on these funds, it said. HRW believes some of the estimated US$ 750 million to $US one billion profits from bunkering are channelled into the procurement of weapons used in the delta violence. It said many local politicians were closely involved with the gangs that control the bunkering. It also accused them of engaging the ethnic militias to ensure they were elected and to defend their illegal operations. Dan Iremiju, leader of the militant Itsekiri National Youth Council, agreed with the report that most of the fighting in the delta this year had centred on the activities of oil thieves. He alleged that elements in the Nigerian navy had been providing protection to Ijaw gangs tapping oil from the pipelines for years. “Much of the fighting was between two business partners, the naval unit in Warri and the illegal oil dealers,” he told IRIN. “I don't know what went sour in the relationship.” But militant Ijaw leader, Dan Ekpebide, disputed claims that any of the fighting was over money from illicit oil deals. “Ijaw people here are saying they've been kept out of the political system and denied access to the resources in their area,” Ekpebide said. “What they're fighting for is political freedom, justice, equity and fair play.” Ekpebide said he believed the Niger Delta was awash with guns because of government militarisation of the oil region. “The soldiers and police are trading off arms for small amounts of money...People have easy access to military weapons because of the military presence,” he said. Government officials were not available for comments on the HRW report.