Police foil attempt to blow oil pipelines

Posted by admin Niger Delta Friday, March 30th, 2012

Police in Bayelsa State have foiled an attempt to blow oil pipelines at Agbura in Yenagoa Local Government Area of the state. The development has thrown the Agbura community into panic with youths and community leaders putting heads together on how to prevent a future occurrence.

The pipeline was about to be blown up by some people claiming to be ex-militants who claimed they had been neglected by the Federal Government.
According to investigations, the natives of Agbura said they noticed some strange people, who entered the community through the waterside.

The Azikoro police station was informed and were placed on a red alert with some men secretly deployed to conduct surveillance on the suspects.
The suspects, aware that the police already had a tip off on them, went into action with the equipment they brought to cut and blow the pipeline.

They were in the act when the police swooped on them and many of them escaped but one of the leaders was however unlucky as he was arrested and all the equipment recovered. Police source declined to give the name of the arrested leader, while the suspect claimed to be one of the ex-militant leaders, who surrendered arms during the amnesty but the committee had refused to accommodate them.

He said those involved in the act were members of the third phase ex-militants who had been denied accommodation into the amnesty programme. Checks indicated that the suspect had made useful confessions during interrogation, providing insight into how they carried out bombing of some oil pipelines in the region recently. The suspect had been transferred to the police headquarters where he was undergoing further interrogations to enable the police get to the root of the matter.

Police sources said the command was on the trail of other members who escaped and they would soon be rounded up.
The National President of the Third Phase ex-militants, Ramsey Umokoro, had disassociated his group from bombing and blowing up of pipelines in the region.

Umokoro, who himself was invited by the Joint Military Task Force ( JTF) in connection with the bombing of an Agip truck line in Brass which the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) claimed responsibility, said agitation by his group did not involved violence.

-Sunwp_posts