Weeks after killing and maiming innocent residents while raiding communities in Ogun state, suspected Niger Delta militants have blown up a gas pipeline in PZ Estate in the Ogijo area of the state.

Members of the community told Channels Television that the incident, which is the first known attack on a pipeline in the south-west under President Muhammadu Buhari, occurred late Tuesday.

Apart from Imo state in the south-east, where a Shell pipeline was blown last month, all other attacks in recent times have happened in the south-south, mainly Delta state.

The suspects in Ogun were said to have attacked the facility while pretending to be officials of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) on maintenance patrol.

The affected pipeline is said to serve an 11.4 distribution line for some companies in Ikorodu, Lagos state.

The scene of the attack has been cordoned off by security personnel.

Though officials of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) believe it is too early to conclude on the identity of those behind the attack, sabotage of such nature has been orchestrated by the creek manors.

Mohammed Tijani, divisional police officer (DPO) of Ogijo police station, said investigations were ongoing.

“What we heard is that during the day, some people disguised as NNPC staff. They reportedly came with two Hilux vehicles and pretended as if they carried out some repairs,” he said.

“Later at night, the explosion occurred.”

The Niger Delta Avengers (NDA), the group which has claimed responsibility for most of the attacks under the current administration, has threatened to storm Lagos.

The group said its aim is to cripple the nation’s economy.

After threatening to clampdown on the militants, President Muhammadu Buhari appealed to them to give peace a chance.

Nigeria’s production capacity, which sunk to an all-time low as a result of the attacks, soared during a two-week ceasefire declared by the militants.

However, the group resumed hostilities some weeks back, accusing the government of insincerity.

Controversies have trailed the sudden disappearance of 71 trailers of rice and other grains allocated to Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Adamawa State by the Federal Government to ameliorate the hardship faced by victims of insurgency in the state.

The Guardian gathered that the 71 trailer loads of grains actually arrived the state only for the items to develop wings two days after the Deputy Governor, Mr. Martins Babale, flagged off the ceremony marking the distribution of the consignment, without getting to the IDP camps or to those that had returned home.

Commenting on the missing trucks of food items, a member of the State House of Assembly, Mr. Emmanuel Tsamdu, said reports from his constituency community leaders confirmed that only 250 bags of 50kg of rice got to Madagali, as against the two trailers of 600 bags of 50kg per one trailer load.


Tsamdu urged the Federal Government to immediately set up a committee to investigate what he described as the worse crime against humanity and corrupt behaviour.
Details of the planned distribution listed the seven local government councils in the northern part of the state, which were the worst hit by the Boko Haram attack, as beneficiaries of the highest allocation.

But checks by The Guardian revealed that Madagali local council, that was the worse hit due to its closeness to Sambisa forest, was allocated only two trailers of rice. When contacted the District Head of Guluk, headquarters of Madagali council, Mr. Bello Ichadi, disclosed that only five district heads of the council received 50 bags of 25kg rice, making a total of 250bags for the entire Madagali council.

It was also discovered that while the rice and other grains were packaged in 50kg bags, the few bags given to the Madagali Chiefs were in 25kg bags, indicating that there was rebagging of the grains by those charged with the distribution.

Executive Secretary of the state Emergency Management Agency, Mr. Haruna Furo, told The Guardian that his agency, which is in charged of managing IDPs in the state was not involved in the distribution of the grains from the Federal Government to the state.

His words: “I cannot tell exactly what went wrong with the distribution, because we are the agency that is charged with the responsibilities of taking care of IDPs. But we were not involved in recent exercise, it was done in Abuja; even the sharing formular. Many people are calling my office, bringing complaints, but the only thing we can say is we are not part of the exercise, so we don’t know how the distribution was done and the formular that was used.”