The Nigerian military is asking all
foreign and local oil workers in the country’s volatile Niger Delta region to disregard
the latest threat from the region’s main armed group.
In an email statement,
the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta or MEND said it was standing
firm on its 72-hour ultimatum to local and foreign oil workers to leave the
region or face the fury of what MEND called Hurricane Piper Alpha.
The
ultimatum expires around midnight Monday.
Colonel Rabe Abubakar, spokesman
for the military’s Joint Task Force (JTF) in the Niger Delta, said the JTF is ready and capable to crush MEND once and for
all.
“My
reaction has always been known that MEND is an organization which should not be
taken seriously. Secondly, I ask all oil workers, both our foreign friends and
the local workers to disregard whatever threat MEND might have passed out,” he
said.
Abubakar
described MEND as a faceless organization and said the JTF was out in force to
protect all oil workers.
“As
I’m talking to you, JTF and other security agencies are all over the place…we
are ready more than ever before to crush any group no matter where it comes
from,” Abubakar said.
MEND
compared its latest threat to a hurricane which it said does not discriminate
when it hits.
But
Abubakar said MEND is a toothless organization that has made repeated threats
before but incapable of carrying out such threats.
“This
is not the first time…however, I’m advising the foreigners and the local
workers that they should be security-conscious, and they should report any
suspicious persons to the nearest security agency or JTF,” Abubakar said.
He
said the JTF has mapped out a strategy to protect all oil facilities and
workers. But Abubakar said workers should always be security-conscious.
Some
civil society organizations have accused the Nigerian military of rights abuses
during its weeks-long Niger Delta offensive.
But
Abubakar said it’s a smear campaign to say that the Joint Task Force has
deliberately been involved in human rights abuses. He said the JTF has been
extremely careful in the conduct of its Niger Delta offensive.