Σελίδες

Παρασκευή 17 Οκτωβρίου 2008

Οι "φωτιές" .. δεν σβήνουν στο Δέλτα του Νίγηρα ...


Να καθυσηχάσει τους τοπικους παράγοντες προσπαθει ο φιλοδυτικός πρόεδρος της Νιγηρίας Yar Adua. Aν και στις αμφισβητούμενες εκλογές του 2007 , έλαβε κατα τα επίσημα αποτελέσματα το 70% , η χώρα είναι βαθειά διαιρεμένη , με το κίνημα ΜEND να προκαλεί προβλήματα στις πετρελαιοπαραγωγές εταιρίες στο Δέλτα και το Ισλαμικό κίνημα να ελέγχει τον Βορά. Η εκλογή Ομπάμα θα σηματοδοτήσει στροφή της Αμερικανικής πολιτικής προς την Αφρική , με την Νιγηρία από τις πρώτες προτεραιότητες. Σκοπός αυτής της στροφής θα είναι μεταξύ άλλων και η ανακοπή της Κινεζικής επιρροής στην Αφρική που την τελευταία 10ετία έχει αυξηθεί.
Δεν θα πρέπει να μας προκαλέσει έκπληξη αν δουμε στο άμεσο μέλλον ΝΑΤΟική αρμάδα να προστατεύει τα πετρελαικά συμφέροντα στην περιοχή , κατά τα προτυπα της αποστολής στην Σομαλία.
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Nigeria's President Yar' Adua has assured the South-South leaders he will do all he can to address the Niger-Delta crisis and restore peace.


"We shall do anything as an Administration within available resources and the imperfect constitutional provisions within which we are constrained to operate."
Yar’Adua said with the setting up of the Niger-Delta ministry his administration is now set to look into the major concerns of the region which according to him are infrastructural development, cleaning and youth empowermentJustice Adolphus Karibui-Whyte who led the 11 man delegation to the president said that they had come to present a resolution of the Vanguard-organised South-South Legislative retreat on constitutional review held August 2008 at the Federal Government. Karibu warned that no leader will ignore this communiqué, according to the Leadership.Karibu said: "From what I know of the President, he would not say what he does not mean. The suggestions we made (in the report presented yesterday) are serious, genuine and salutary to this country. Anybody who ignores such serious suggestions, and knowing the sensitive nature of the matter of the Niger Delta, at that stage, we will begin to doubt his sincerity. But at the moment, we believe that he (President Yar'Adua) means something serious."

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The All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP)

is the oposition conservative political party in Nigeria. At the last legislative elections (21 April 2007), the party won 27.0% of the popular vote and 92 out of 360 seats in the House of Representatives and 27 out of 109 seats in the Senate. Its candidate in the presidential elections of 19 April 2003, former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari, won 32.2% of the vote. Buhari was again the ANPP candidate in the 2007 presidential election, taking second place and about 18% of the vote according to official results.
The ANPP is the household party in the extreme north of
Nigeria, primarily due to its mass appeal. It is the strongest opposition party, controlling seven of the nation's thirty-six states. The party's biggest achievement in the 2003 election was its gubernatorial victory in Kano State where it defeated the ruling People's Democratic Party to take control of one of the country's most populous state.
In the
21 April 2007 Nigerian National Assembly election, the party won 62 out of 360 seats in the House of Representatives and 16 out of 109 seats in the Senate.
Following the 2007 election, the ANPP challenged the victory of
Umaru Yar'Adua and his People's Democratic Party, although it was announced on June 27, 2007, following talks, that the ANPP had agreed to join Yar'Adua's government. There was reportedly disagreement within the ANPP about the talks.[2] Buhari subsequently denounced the idea in a BBC interview and suggested that the decision was only made by part of the party, alleging that they were "just looking for jobs for themselves"

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MEND : σύντομη αναδρομή του κινήματος στο Δέλτα του Νίγηρα


Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Movement for the
Emancipation of the Niger Delta ("MEND") is a militant indigenous people's movement dedicated to armed struggle against what they call the exploitation and oppression of the people of Niger Delta and the degradation of the natural environment by foreign multinational corporations involved in the extraction of oil in the Niger Delta and the Federal Government of Nigeria. MEND has been linked to attacks on foreign owned petroleum companies in Nigeria in an attempt to create an artificial Hubbert peak.
MEND's stated goals are to localize control of Nigeria's oil and to secure reparations from the national government for
pollution caused by the oil industry. In an interview with one of the group's leaders, who used the alias Major-General Godswill Tamuno, the BBC reported that MEND was fighting for "total control" of the Niger Delta's oil wealth, saying local people had not gained from the riches under the ground and the region's creeks and swamps." [1] The Economist has described the organization as one that "portrays itself as political organisation that wants a greater share of Nigeria’s oil revenues to go to the impoverished region that sits atop the oil. In fact, it is more of an umbrella organisation for several armed groups, which it sometimes pays in cash or guns to launch attacks." [1]
Additionally MEND has called for President Olusegun Obasanjo to free two jailed ethnic Ijaw leaders — Mujahid Dokubo-Asari, who is jailed and charged with treason, and Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, a former governor of Bayelsa State charged with corruption.
In a January 2006 email MEND warned the oil industry, "It must be clear that the Nigerian government cannot protect your workers or assets. Leave our land while you can or die in it.... Our aim is to totally destroy the capacity of the Nigerian government to export oil."
[2] The militants have bombed two pipelines, triggering an international increase in the cost of oil. Recently MEND kidnapped four foreign oil workers, who are from Bulgaria, Britain, Honduras and the United States. Violence and destruction by MEND in 2007 caused Chevron to shut down some oil production after one Nigerian sailor was killed and six other foreign oil workers were kidnapped by members of MEND. MEND reportedly attacked the company's Oloibiri floating production, storage, and offloading vessel off southern Bayelsa state on May 1, 2007. [3] In September 2008, MEND released a statement proclaiming that their militants had launched an "oil war" throughout the Niger Delta against both, pipelines and oil production facilities, and the Nigerian soldiers that protect them. In the statement MEND claimed to have killed 22 Nigerian soldiers in one attack against a Chevron owned oil platform. The Nigerian government confirmed that their troops were attacked in numerous locations, but added that all assaults were repelled with the infliction of heavy casualties on the militants.


For the roughly fifty years since Nigeria declared independence from British colonial rule, oil has been produced in Nigeria. Throughout this period corporate politics has intersected with successive dictatorships. Under these dictatorships the Nigerian government has signed laws that appropriated oil resources and placed these under the control of multinational oil companies, such as Chevron Corporation, and most notably, Shell.
From the point of view of MEND, and its supporters, the people of the Niger Delta have suffered an unprecedented degradation of their
environment due to unchecked pollution produced by the oil industry. As a result of this policy of dispossessing people from their lands in favor of foreign oil interests, within a single generation, many now have no ability to fish or farm. People living in the Niger Delta have found themselves in a situation where their government and international oil companies own all the oil under their feet, the revenues of which are rarely seen by the people who are suffering from the consequences of it.

MEND's attacks involve substantially more sophisticated tactics than those of previous militant groups in the Niger Delta, which typically involved "either riots and/or protests or bunkering gone awry."[citation needed] MEND's recent tactics have included:
Swarm-based maneuvers: Guerrillas are using speed boats in the Niger Delta's swamps to quickly attack targets in succession. Multiple, highly maneuverable units have kept the government and Shell's defensive systems off-balance defending the sprawling network.
Radically improved firepower and combat training: allowing guerrillas to overpower a combination of Shell's Western-trained
private military guards and elite Nigerian units in several engagements. (One of Shell's private military operators was captured as a hostage.)
Effective use of system disruption: Targets have been systematically and accurately selected to completely shut down production and delay and/or halt repairs, and the guerrillas are making effective use of Shell's hostages to coerce both the government and the company.


On May 3, 2008, MEND militants attacked Shell-operated pipelines in Nigeria, forcing the company to halt 170,000 barrels a day of exports of Bonny Light crude.[

In June 20, 2008, MEND naval forces attacked the Shell-operated Bonga oil platform, shutting down 10% of Nigeria's oil production in one fell swoop. The oil platform, Shell's flagship project in the area capable of extracting a massive 200,000 barrels of oil a day, was widely assumed to be outside the reach of the militants due to its location 120km off-shore. This attack has demonstrated a level of prowess and sophistication never before seen by the rebels and it is now known that all of Nigeria's oil platforms are within range of MEND attack.
On September 14, 2008, MEND inaugurated
Operation Hurricane Barbarossa with an ongoing string of militant attacks to bring down the oil industry in Rivers State
On September 27, a week after declaring an oil war and sustaining heavy losses at the hands of the Nigerian armed forces, the group declared a ceasefire starting the next until "further notice.

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