Leaks

“Drip…drip…drip…KABOOM!!!!...” This seems to be the recurring sound these days across Nigeria’s pipeline sites. Hundreds of charred cadavers lie strewn across the bordering right-of-ways, with flaming jerry cans scattered between the bodies like hideous confetti. Hours after, the infernos rage still, defying the dousing efforts of panicky villagers and mediocre firemen, billowing for days even under heavy-duty Julius Berger hoses, until they flag, falter, then fail, spent of fuel. Each time, the country’s oil monolith, the NNPC, blames the squalor-driven desperation of the corpses for the dastardly acts of roguery. Conveniently, the roasted slabs of flesh cannot protest, forever muted by the fires that claimed them and all decipherable evidence, while the real vandals slip away with their loot, mentally anticipating their next serpentine strike...

Pipeline vandalism is regularity in Nigeria, more than the authorities would have us believe, and only waxes sensational when there are fires. It is a super-coordinated franchise spanning through the crooked corridors of state, from the underhanded senators who employ the vandals, the compromised oil officials who detail such information as when the pipelines is actually carrying petrol, to corrupt customs men who grant passage and proffer bogus shipping documents ferrying the illicit premium motor spirit, i.e. petrol, to buyers in the black market. Usually the motives have been purely glut-driven, but recent attacks on an important flow station, the Atlas Cove, point to more macabre intentions.

‘Atlas Cove’ is a term that has been used frequently in recent news reports of the vandalism acts. Located in Mosimi, Lagos state, it is one of the nerve centres in Nigeria’s pipeline system from which imported gasoline is pumped to the rest of the nation, to the tune of 58-60 million litres monthly (“Er-hem, that is 36 million litres. Officially, of course”). Three weeks ago, an Awori pipeline supplying this site was vandalised and a fire started that killed over 270 people. Days later, flow units in Atlas Cove itself were vandalised. Repairs were hurriedly put through and for two weeks it was all-clear – until Tuesday last week, when the vandals struck again at an NNPC pipeline in the Ijegbu area of Lagos state, prompting the NNPC to suspend pumping to Atlas Cove yet again. And judging from the non-random nature of these attacks, they are not about to end anytime soon.

It’s been a steady build-up from as far back as February 8 2006, when the Escravos-Warri pipeline that transports crude oil to Nigeria’s Kaduna and Warri refineries were attacked. Since then, vandalism of products pipelines have occurred predominantly in three axes crucial to petroleum products distribution in the country i.e. the Atlas Cove-Mosimi, Abuja-Suleja and Port Harcourt flow stations, moving up from only 750 line breaks in 2003 to over 2700 between January and September last year, about the same time the politics hype began to herald the 2007 elections season. The systematic stab at Nigeria’s economic lifeblood is no error. Someone is attempting to force the nation to its knees, possibly for political reasons.

Meanwhile the government appears desperate to restore normalcy, diverting gasoline vessels to discharge at private depots. Pipeline sites are naturally bristling with the military. Security is however also being tightened surreptitiously in ways unconnected with the line breaks, with the police force beefed up numerically in strategically located states. To give you an idea, the state capital in which yours truly's domiciled has been supplied with enough servicemen to capably mount surveillance in grids of a 5-mile radius.

Is someone nudging Nigeria into an impending state of emergency? And to what pernicious end? Could it be phantom enemies of democracy that stand to benefit? Could it be Biafran secessionists - or perhaps protagonists of the botched Third Term campaign? Who in the world could be responsible? Who indeed…?