Port Harcourt — Controversy raged yesterday over the claim by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), one of the militant groups operating in the nation's oil producing areas that it had attacked a major pipeline belonging to Chevron and Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) at Abonema, Rivers State.

MEND had in a statement yesterday said that it has resumed its hostilities in the Niger Delta region where a Shell facility was hit, but both the oil company and the Joint Task Force (JTF) dismissed the report. Shell and JTF said no such attack occurred in the area.

MEND said its fighters, armed with rocket launchers and machine guns, carried out a "warning strike" overnight on a Royal Dutch Shell or Chevron pipeline in Abonemma.

The group accused the government of using the ill health of President Umaru Yar'Adua, who has been in Saudi Arabia for more than three weeks receiving treatment for a heart condition, to stall negotiations promised as part of the amnesty programme.

MEND insisted it launched the attack at 0200hrs yesterday with 35 fighters using assault rifles, rocket launchers and heavy calibre machine guns, and described the hit as a "Warning strike".

The group alleged that foreign investors in the oil and gas companies have been told that everything in the Niger Delta was under control with the alleged doling out of money to some repentant militants.

It also frowned at the fact that while the implementation of peace and development initiatives of the Niger Delta were being suspended pending the recovery of the President, repairs to oil facilities and exploration did not abate in the region.

The statement sent online by spokesman of the militants, Gbomo Jomo, said the group is still open to dialogue without letting its guard down on how to restore the right of the people to the wealth in their area.

According to MEND, the attack was carried out for the following reasons:

"While the Nigerian government has conveniently tied the advancement of talks on the demands of this group to a sick president, it has not tied the repair of pipelines, exploitation of oil and gas as well as the deployment and re-tooling of troops in the region to the president's ill health.

"While wishing the president a speedy recovery, a situation where the future of the Niger Delta is tied to the health and well being of one man is unacceptable.

"The government, through the Bayelsa State Governor, Ministers for Defence and Information has been disseminating propaganda aimed at foreign investors claiming that the situation in the Niger Delta is under control. This assertion is far from the truth.

"Also the government has been offering bribes to a number of militants who surrendered their birth rights under its amnesty programme in the form of contracts. The government perceives these individuals to wield some kind of influence in the region. The group wants to make it abundantly clear that all those who have capitulated are of no significance to the continuation of the struggle.

"MEND is committed to continue its fight for the restoration of the land and rights of the people of the Niger Delta which has been stolen for 50 years.

"MEND remains open to dialogue; however, the indefinite ceasefire ordered by the group on Sunday, October 25, 2009 will be reviewed within 30 days from today, December 19, 2009", the group stated.

Spokesman for SPDC, Mr. Precious Okolobo, told THISDAY he had not been briefed on any attack on the company's facility.

"We don't have reports of our facility being attacked and cannot comment", he said, corroborating the position of the spokesman for the JTF, Lieutenant Colonel Timothy Antigha, who had denied such an attack.

Antigha said in a text message yesterday that, "There is no verification yet by the JTF that a pipeline has been sabotaged around Abonema. If this act of unpatriotism is confirmed to be true at a time the Federal Government is doing its utmost best to consolidate on the gains of the amnesty programme, then the criminals behind the act are enemies of Niger Delta and indeed Nigeria and they don't deserve any sympathy".

Oil revenue, which is the major source of income for the entire country was threatened by the oil war which had cut the nation's oil output by about a quarter in recent years.

At the height of the crisis, the militants tapped into pipelines, siphoned off oil and sold it on a huge scale. Some analysts estimated the illicit industry generated more than $50million a day.

According to Reuters, more than 10,000 militants were hiding out in 50 to 60 camps, more than 250 expatriate oil workers kidnapped since 2006.

Rebellion had cut oil production by estimated one million barrels a day at a period when oil firms reportedly spent $3.7bn on security in 2008.

Meanwhile, with the introduction of amnesty programme in the third quarter of the year, total oil out surged with the corresponding improvement in the value of naira.