- Says waterways have been opened for free movement
- Calls on all to disregard rumour of attack, urges all to go about normal duties
- Seeks cooperation of oil companies in govt security programmes
The Executive Chairman of Warri North Local Government Council, Hon. Smart Asekutu has declared that there is peace in the area and has called on indigenes and oil companies operating in the different communities to go about their normal businesses even as he urged them to disregard any false alarm of any planned attack.
The Council Boss who interacted with newsmen in Warri yesterday shortly after he returned from a private hospital where he visited some members of Warri North vigilante group who were injured in an ambush attack by a gang of miscreants, averred that there is peace in the Local Government now.
Asekutu disclosed that the waterways have been opened for free movement as he called on indigenes and oil companies operating in the area to go about their normal businesses without fear of attack, advising the people to shun rumour-mongering.
He said: “Yes, the waterway has been opened and there is free movement in the area now. There is no problem in Warri North Local Government Area now. I also want to use this medium to encourage everybody to maintain peace and go about their normal duty. They should not give themselves to rumour mongering. There is no problem, Warri North is very peaceful and everybody should go about their normal business.”
Giving insight into what happened in the Local Government Area, Asekutu said that a group of local vigilantes recognized by the government was patrolling the Egbema area to ensure peace, when they were ambushed by a gang of miscreants in the waterways. The vigilantes who were taken unawares lost four of their men, some maimed while others are still missing.
The Council boss stated that the local vigilantes was made up of repentant ex-militants who embraced the federal government amnesty programme, adding that they have been doing their job diligently and maintaining peace in the area.
“First of all, all the things that happened in the past few weeks were things that people did not planned for. There were miscreants going about kidnapping and doing all kind of things. And this set of persons that they brutally killed were people who accepted amnesty and the federal government is paying them stippeneds to maintain peace in the area. And it is so painful that these people did not reneged in their responsibility of maintaining peace at any time. They have grouped themselves to act as vigilante in the waterways and they have been up to the task.
“And even at this point, they were going round to talk to themselves and to see how they can reach out to the miscreants who have been involved in criminality area to appeal to them for peace. It was these miscreants whom they were trying to talk to so that they could return to normal lives. But they turned round and laid ambush for them and attacked them, killing some of them and maiming others.
“So far, we have seen about four corpses and some others are still missing. People are still searching for them to see if they are still alive. It is so painful because these vigilantes who were killed are known to us and they have been doing their legitimate job to ensure that the environment is peaceful. There is peace in Warri North now”, he said.
The Council boss also used the opportunity to call on the oil companies operating in the area to cooperate with the government in its effort to ensure enduring peace in the area, adding that neither the companies’ facilities nor their personnel can be guarantee safety when there is chaos in their operational bases.
He recalled that upon resumption as a Council chairman, there was a disagreement between the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company, NPDC, one of the oil companies operating in the area and some host communities over an oil spillage in the company’s facility. According to him, the failure of the company to take necessary steps to address the effects of the spill led to the occupation of its facilities by the locals, adding that, rather than suing for peace, the company was trying to blame a third party for the leakage that occurred in their pipeline buried under a deep river bed, a situation which the chairman said, was not true.
He noted that the companies were in the habit of breaching the contents of MoU’s they entered with the host communities in the interest of peace, adding that without peace, the companies cannot operate successfully besides the fact that their facilities and lives of their personnel will be at risk.
He said: “I want to use this medium to call on some of the oil companies operating in the area that they should not make things difficult for us. They have some kind of understanding with the communities but when they start working they would not want to keep to the terms of the MoUs. They are just acking funny.
“Do you know that when I came on board, there was an incident of oil spillage in the area.
The communities occupied NPDC flowstation in protest. We had to go to the site with my team to talk to the people to evacuate and that we can always talk. The company is known and our Council is known.
“We can go and talk and be able to handle the issue together. When we came back to the Council, we made available relief materials to the people because the spill covered the whole waterways. Low tide will take the spill to some communities that are far inside and high tide will bring it to some Itsekiri communities.
“Thank God for the governor of the State, Senator Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa who understood the situation in the area and made some relief materials available which we also shared to all the communities. This is because, the water carried the spill to so many communities.
“Now, after that, we expected that NPDC, as a very responsible company that owes corporate social responsibility to the people to at least show some concern. We wrote inviting them for a talk but they refused to come. We decided to go to them to talk to see how we can achieve some level of peace. This is because the company is there to work to make profit and when the company maintain peace both parties would benefit mutually. But the company is not doing that. It is when there are problems that they will run to us to ask us to talk to our people.
“We mustn’t wait for troubled times to see if we are together or not. This is unacceptable. The company needs peace more than every other person in the area. The people live in the environment but the company’s facilities and personnel are in the area. The company as an entity should be able to maintain peace and support the programme of the government so that we can be comfortable working and living in the area. Even the companies themselves need a peaceful environment to work.”
It would be recalled that the Military Task Force imposed a lockdown in the waterways early this month when the miscreants operating in the area killed some of their personnel. It took the intervention of government officials including high military authorities in Abuja for the Army to reopen the waterways. The New Diplomat learnt that it was less than a week after that incident when the same criminal gang ambushed the local security vigilante and killed four of them.
