By Adaobi Rhema Oguejiofor
The Human Rights Writers Association Of Nigeria (HURIWA), a leading civil rights advocacy body, has appealed to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to take a transparent, accountable and open stand against the crude oil thieves, which it said are in the military.
The rights group also asked President Tinubu to act decisively and “cut off the heads of the snakes within the military institution, particularly those that are suspected conspirators with crude oil thieves operating as a cartel.”
According to HURIWA, the silence of President Tinubu for over 48 hours since some Naval officers were intercepted by a private security company that was escorting a ship conveying massive amounts of stolen crude oil in the Niger Delta is offensive.
The Group added that the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria can no longer enjoy the luxury of being lackadaisical or lukewarm towards conquering the powerful cartel currently looting the country’s crude oil resources and creating environmental damage to the environment of the crude oil producing communities, thereby depriving Nigeria of huge foreign generated revenue.
“Specifically, Nigeria has lost an opportunity to produce and sell about 65,700,000 barrels of oil in the last one year as a result of issues concerning pipeline vandalism and the resultant oil theft. This, we found out, translates to about N2.3tn loss in oil revenue if the prevailing exchange rate and average oil price are used,” HURIWA maintained.