Ijaw leader, Chief Edwin Clark, has urged the Federal Government to set up a judicial enquiry to comprehensively investigate oil theft in the country.
He expressed anger over the theft of the nation’s major revenue earner by those he said ought to guide against the illegality.
The former Federal Commissioner also accused the top echelon of security agencies, and those he called strong cartel in government, of being culpable in the stealing of the country’s oil.
Clark’s call is coming on the heels of the recent exposure of a four-kilometre pipeline from Forcados terminal to the sea.
The Group Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), Mele Kyari, had said the illegal four kilometre pipeline had been undetected for nine years.
Forcados is operated by the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC), the Nigerian subsidiary of Shell Plc.
In his call for action, titled: A Call for Judicial Enquiry Into the Criminal Act of Oil Theft Now Sabotaging Our National Economy, Clark said top government cabals were behind the crude oil theft.
He also called for the establishment of modular refineries to tackle bunkering.
The Ijaw leader, who spoke in Abuja, expressed his opposition against the illegality.
Clark said youths from Niger Delta region had no other options than to seek means of survival in the face of deprivation and neglect.
The Ijaw leader stressed that the issue of crude oil theft has become entrenched in the country as it has been going on for over 50 years.
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He said: “About 200 barrels of crude oil are being stolen from there every day. This has been going on since 2014.”
The 200 barrels per day, according to him, is part of the 470,000 barrels of crude oil that is being lost every month, amounting to $700 million.
Clark said although the NNPCL thought the theft had been going on in the past 20 years, he said: “Some of us have always insisted that this oil theft has been going on for much longer, for about 50 years.”
He added: “I want to advise the Federal Government to institute a judicial enquiry to investigate this criminal act of oil theft.”
Clark supported his claim by citing an investigation conducted under President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration where some personnel of the Nigerian Navy were indicted.
The Ijaw leader hailed Chief Government Ekpemupolo (aka Tompolo) for exposing the four-kilometre pipeline.
sincerity of purpose, to relocate their operational headquarters to the Niger Delta region, if there is a genuine desire to end this menace.”
Clark explained how youths in oil producing communities got involved in the illegal business, saying: “The youths of the Niger Delta had to look for a means of survival. This is not, however, to support their activities.
“I am, therefore, using this opportunity to again appeal to my fellow Nigerians who have taken over the ownership and management of the oil industries in the Niger Delta, the NNPCL in particular, to employ our youths into the various departments of the oil industries and not to make them beggars in their own home.
“The unity of Nigeria can only be kept if the citizens are all equal and everybody has the opportunity to climb to the highest office in his/her country.”