Nigeria: Bonga - Time to Mend

24 June 2008
editorial

Lagos — Time is running out on mending the broken hopes of indigenes of the Niger Delta. Governments, since independence prefer empty talks to developing the region.

The result is the mixture of militancy and criminality that has taken over the area. Governments have had no answer to them. Attacks on oil facilities have gone on for years, but the notion, now wrong, was that off-shore facilities like Bonga, which daily delivered about 200,000 barrels of crude, were beyond the reach of militant groups like the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND. Last week's attack that shut down the facility denied Nigeria daily revenue of N10 billion. The loss includes losses from other fields that are out of operation over agitations from host communities, or militants.

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