Niger Delta Avengers claims more attacks on Chevron installations

Niger Delta Avengers, the new militant group that has claimed responsibility for a string of attacks on oil and gas installations in the Niger Delta, has, again, says it has destroyed more oil wells.

The group announced the latest attack via its Twitter handle Wednesday morning, saying it blew up Chevron oil wells RMP 23 and RMP 24.

“With the heavy presence of 100 gunboats, 4 warships and jet bombers, NDA blew up Chevron oil wells RMP 23 and RMP 24 3:44 a.m. this morning,” the group tweeted.

The Avengers also ridiculed the Nigerian military, saying its successful activities had shown “the whole world that Nigeria military is good in harassing innocent civilians”.

The group has launched several attacks on oil and gas infrastructure since February 2016, demanding a sovereign nation of the Niger Delta people.

Sola Adebawo, Director of Communications at Chevron, declined to confirm or deny the latest development to PREMIUM TIMES on Wednesday morning.

“We are not able to comment on security matters for now,” Mr. Adebawo said. “Our priority is to ensure safety of our staff and assets.”

Army spokesman, Sani Usman, said he had not been informed of the attacks.

The Avengers had rejected a meeting recently convened in Abuja by the federal government, warning of its readiness to carry out an attack that will “shock the whole world”.

“The Niger Delta stakeholder’s meeting is an insult to the people of Niger Delta. What we need is a Sovereign State not pipeline Contracts.

“To the IOC’s, Indigenous Oil Companies and Nigeria Military. Watch out something big is about to happen and it will shock the whole world,” the group tweeted on Friday.

Last Thursday, it claimed responsibility for an attack on a gas pipeline belonging to Chevron in Delta state.

“We warned Chevron, but they didn’t listen. NDA just blew up the Escravos tank farm main electricity feed pipeline,” it said.

The militants said the oil facilities were sabotaged following attempts by Chevron to carry out repairs of main Escravos crude oil pipeline it blew up earlier.

A spokesperson for the group, Mudoch Agbinibo, had earlier this month warned the Nigerian government of further attacks if their demands were not met.

Two weeks ago, Chevron’s Makaraba crude oil line was attacked on the offshore Okan manifold in the region.

The attack followed previous ones on NNPC, Agip, Shell and other major oil corporations’ facilities across the delta states and it has resulted in the loss of over 40,000 barrels of crude oil per day.