Nigerian Rebel Movement Vows To Cripple Oil Exports - All Africa

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) yesterday vowed to cripple oil exports from the Niger Delta region by providing arms including anti-aircraft gunships to the leader of the Niger Delta Vigilante Movement, Mr Ateke Tom in what it said was a renewed bid to counter any possible offensive by Federal Government's Joint-military Task Force against it.

Specifically, the support, MEND said, would be in form of providing him their fighters and making available heavy duty war machines including anti-aircraft to ensure that they present a formidable front to counter Federal troops.

They, therefore warned that "Civilians inside capital cities in the Niger Delta states of Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Delta, and Rivers are advised to avoid milling around army check points and armouredpersonnel carriers as they have become targets for attacks by explosive devices".

They also announced the coming together of all factions of MEND for the common purpose of protecting the interest of the Niger Delta, adding that the common enemy to all the groups was the Federal Government.

EDIT

http://allafrica.com/stories/200801040203.html

From the thread the other day in LBN:
"Oil futures hit $100 a barrel"
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=3121694&mesg_id=3121694

Or is that to Nigeria?

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0702/feature3/index.html?fs=www3.nationalgeographic.com&fs=plasma.nationalgeographic.com

Curse of the Black Gold
Hope and Betrayal in the Niger Delta

Oil fouls everything in southern Nigeria. It spills from the pipelines, poisoning soil and water. It stains the hands of politicians and generals, who siphon off its profits. It taints the ambitions of the young, who will try anything to scoop up a share of the liquid riches—fire a gun, sabotage a pipeline, kidnap a foreigner.

Nigeria had all the makings of an uplifting tale: poor African nation blessed with enormous sudden wealth. Visions of prosperity rose with the same force as the oil that first gushed from the Niger Delta's marshy ground in 1956. The world market craved delta crude, a "sweet," low-sulfur liquid called Bonny Light, easily refined into gasoline and diesel. By the mid-1970s, Nigeria had joined OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries), and the government's budget bulged with petrodollars.

Everything looked possible—but everything went wrong.

Dense, garbage-heaped slums stretch for miles. Choking black smoke from an open-air slaughterhouse rolls over housetops. Streets are cratered with potholes and ruts. Vicious gangs roam school grounds. Peddlers and beggars rush up to vehicles stalled in gas lines. This is Port Harcourt, Nigeria's oil hub, capital of Rivers state, smack-dab in the middle of oil reserves bigger than the United States' and Mexico's combined. Port Harcourt should gleam; instead, it rots.