A few days after President Bola Ahmed Tinubu was declared winner of the Saturday February 25, 2023, Presidential election in the country, conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the then National Women Leader of the All Progressive Congress (APC), Dr. Betta Edu, now Federal Minister reportedly stated that President-Elect,(as he then was), has huge plans for the people of the Niger Delta..
Dr. Betta Edu made the statement precisely on March 2, 2023, when she featured on GbaramatuVoice programme ‘Election Headquarters’ said in parts; “I think he has a huge plan for the region, some of it is stated in his action plan, but I’d go quite straight to the point. First, he will actually carry out capital projects in the region that will improve the living conditions of persons in the region. The second point is to finish up the work that President Buhari has started in the region and then of course the third one is to financially empower people in the region through employment, education and others.”
At first, many viewed the above comment by the former Cross River State Commissioner of Health, as another political remark coming from a personality clad with the euphoria of electoral victory by her political party, the All Progressive Congress (APC). But recent development in the Niger Delta region, has however, revealed a hopeful sign of ingrained truth.
First and very fundamental evidence of a likely development of the region is Mr. President’s recent appointment of new board of the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, on August 29th, 2023, to among other responsibilities, offer a lasting solution to the socio-economic difficulties of the Niger Delta Region and to facilitate the rapid and sustainable development of the Niger Delta into a region that is economically prosperous, socially stable, ecologically regenerative and politically peaceful.
In line with the appointment, the House of Representatives have, screened and confirmed members of the Board. The board which currently awaits inauguration by Mr. President has Mr Chiedu Ebie, a Lawyer and former Secretary to the Delta state Government, as the Board Chairman alongside 16 others members.
Before the dust raised by excitement arising from such appointments, screening and confirmation could settle, another was up. This time around, it has to do with the reported renewal on Monday, October 16, 2023, of a crude oil pipeline protection contract awarded by the Federal Government through the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited *NNPCL), to Tantita Security Services Limited for another three years. The contract was first awarded last year (2022).
For those unfamiliar with the Niger Delta region, the presence of pipelines within the region is a common feature.
Report has it that the total length of pipelines that emanated from the region is approximately 5001 kilometres. This includes 666 kilometres of crude oil pipelines and 4,315 kilometers of pipelines carrying multiple products, connecting the 22 petroleum storage facilities, the four petroleum refining plants (in Port Harcourt Ⅰ and Ⅱ, Kaduna, and Warri), the off-shore terminals (in Bonny and Escravos), and the jetties (in Atlas Cove, Calabar, Okirika, and Warri).
On its part, Tantita Security Services Limited going by available information is a pioneering indigenous security company headquartered in Warri, Delta State, and the heart of the Niger Delta Region in Nigeria, owned by High Chief Government Oweizide Ekpemupolo (born 1971) predominantly referred to by his sobriquet Tompolo. He is a former Nigerian militant commander of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta(MEND). and the chief priest of the Egbesu deity, which is the Niger-Deltan god of war.
It was established with a commitment to safeguarding critical assets specializing in providing comprehensive security solutions tailored to the unique needs of the Oil and Gas Sector, and blessed with a rich legacy of excellence, making it a trusted partner for clients seeking unparalleled security expertise in the oil and gas sector.
Following the recent expiration of the pipeline surveillance contract awarded to Tantita Group by the former President Mahammadu Buhari led Federal Government; the call for its renewal was met with stiff opposition.
Despite the arguments advanced by those that opposed its renewal, this piece believed and still believes that its renewal was not only necessary but eminently desirable. The facts are glaring and speak for it.
Undoubtedly, the Nigeria’s petroleum sector without going into specifics has rightly been the backbone of Nigeria’s economy and paradoxically in the accounts by AI Okoli doubled as a centre for the primitive accumulation of wealth as well as a platform for petro-rentier crimes.
Within this sector, petroleum rents have been the object of an opportunistic scramble by corrupt political elites and their counterparts. In effect, the significance of oil wealth in Nigeria has been contradictory: it has been a blessing as well as a curse, by generating both revenue and criminality. This seeming paradox resonates with the “resource-curse” thesis’’.
But the coming of the surveillance contract regime appears to have changed the narrative in our republic.
Tompolo’s Tantita operations have also settled the debate as to whether a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) can assist in designing and implementing complex policies related to national asset management. Tantita’s efficiency in this given assignment of managing national assert has signalled a radical departure from the past, where government officials only made a pious commitment to rid the country of the menace of crude theft, which has not only inflicted significant economic losses on Nigeria and legitimate stakeholders in the oil industry and perpetuated a cycle of corruption, environmental devastation, and social instability.
This piece is not alone in this line of believe, Analysts have at different times and places summarized how the pipeline surveillance contract is decreasing crude oil theft in the country and increasing foreign earnings for the nation.
Also worth mentioning is the July 7, 2023, arrest of a vessel, MT Tura II (IMO number: 6620462), along Escravos River in Warri South West Local Government Area of Delta State, by Tompolos Tantita Security Services Nigeria Ltd, with about 150,000 metric tonnes of stolen crude oil valued at about $86.8 million.
Viewed from applied prism, experience arising from the surveillance mechanism proved beyond reasonable doubt that the nation Nigeria may actually not need gunboats to protect its national claims and solve its other problems, particularly in the oil-rich Niger Delta region, notorious for crude oil theft and pipeline vandalism. Rather, what the nation needs is sincere and selfless leadership, a politically and economically restructured polity.
Most profound, media reports have it that barely two months after the multi-billion naira oil security contract in the Niger Delta region, Government Ekpemupolo discovered over 58 illegal points in Delta and Bayelsa States where crude oil are stolen from. The number of such illegal points discovered have since risen to a number that runs into hundreds.
More specifically, there was a media report that Tantita Security Service Nigeria Limited, on Thursday, October 7, 2022, successfully arrested a crude oil tanker loaded with an unspecified quantity of crude oil at the Escravos River in Warri South West Local Government Area of Delta State.
Viewed broadly, if policymakers in the country could take time to study Tantita’s recruitment process, operational dynamics and environmental matrix, they(public office holders) will discover without labour that Tantita as a company and pipeline Surveillance project run on the wheels of state/Community policing templates.
They share the same spirit, virtues and attributes.
Take, as an illustration, the majority of Tantita’s security personnel were recruited from and posted to the same community/environment where they hail from. They operate and watch over pipelines within their communities and environs. As a result of this security template/roadmap, efficiency is achieved.
Similar results and breakthroughs are precisely what state/community policing could achieve if allowed in the country. The reason for the above assertion is not farfetched.
Separate from the new awareness that globally, the provision of security can no longer be viewed in a unitary way as such thinking is old-fashioned, if an objective analysis can replace emotional discussion regarding state/community police, it is glaring that there are no federal police or state police models, but there are fundamental differences between the two.
While cultural and geographical homogeneity, which are strong factors and advantages of state policing, are lost in federal policing, state police depend on these factors and more, such as history and friendship, to keep society orderly and without anarchy. This value no doubt makes productive policing without the disorder. And state governments have the capacity to fulfil this obligation.
Simply put, the Nigerian government urgently needs to study and possibly adopt or adapt aspects of the Tompolo security model/architecture as it entails the cultivation of stronger local intelligence and networking with communities, traditional rulers and adequate training. This, in specific terms, will include recruiting more police officers from their local government areas, where they would then be stationed in the best traditions of policing worldwide.
Another potentially interesting new awareness arising from Tantita’s second coming, has to do with the volume of youth employment the programme has created and will continue to create.
Aside from creatively curbing youth restiveness in the region within the period under review, another important reason why the ongoing surveillance contract needs to be applauded is that globally, youths are considered a major national asset that will respond to the future leadership of the country and any transformation agenda that does not have job creation for the youth at its centre will take the nation nowhere.”
The seamless cooperation between Tantita security personnel and Federal Government security operatives- the Nigeria Army, Navy, Department of State Security (DSS) Police, and other security apparatus, is another inherent virtue associated with the contract that is worth mentioning.
On the other side of the ‘ledger’, this piece is not comfortable with the way the Federal Government is managing the successes that flow from the pipeline surveillance programme. This particular displeasure is Federal Government-specific.
The ‘culture’ of burning a whole ship with about 150,000 metric tonnes of stolen crude oil valued at about $86.8 million cannot in any way scale as a good leadership judgement. The narrative becomes even more painful when one remembers that a similar step was taken in October 2022 when Tompolo’s men successfully arrested a crude oil tanker loaded with an unspecified quantity of crude oil at the Escravos River in Warri South West Local Government Area of Delta State.
Such action, in my view, amounts to throwing away the baby with bath water and roundly qualifies as economic waste. Most dangerously, burning such a volume of crude translates to first-class environmental pollution. We must as a nation learns how to manage our success by not killing through pollution the people we are meant to protect. Both the people are national assets that must be protected.
This piece, therefore, holds the opinion that going forward; there should be other polite, civil, advanced and creative options to handle the confiscated vessel and its content without endangering the lives of the people of the region.
Finally, Tompolo’s contributions towards restoration of peace and sustainable development in the region is long-standing, noticed across the globe and deeply qualifies him as a catalyst for a new order and Niger Delta region’s ambassador for peace and development. This has made the extension of the contact and the second coming of Tantita Security Company Limited a right step taken in the right direction.
