ABSTRACT
In this study, an attempt has been made to examine the phenomenon of oil theft and illegal bunkering in the Niger Delta with a view to situating its causes, impacts and implications vis-a-vis Nigeria’s economy, national and regional security. The increase of oil theft and illegal bunkering in the Niger Delta region is an economic crime against Nigerian state; it undermines development strategies and engenders social disorder. It constitutes serious economic, security and environmental challenges to the Nigerian state.1 The study observed that the upsurge oil theft has resulted in economic losses by the Nigerian state and oil companies, environmental degradation, insecurity in the Niger Delta region and threat to national and regional security. The study also explored the efforts of successive Nigerian governments to curb the menace and posited that success has not been achieved due to the enthroned corruption by Nigerian elites, high level of youth unemployment, institutional decay and dysfunctions, poor governance, ineffective and corrupt law enforcement agencies, international crime collaborations etc.2
This study examined how centralised management of oil resources which concentrated the benefits of oil wealth in the hands of a very few privileged persons led to chronic opportunism and criminality in the form of illegal oil bunkering in the Niger Delta between 1999 and 2011. Existing analyses on the management of oil resources focus on attendant violent armed conflicts, suppression, exploitation and environmental degradation.3 However, the outbreak and persistence of illegal oil bunkering has not been related to the politics of oil resources management in which private and prebendal ethno-regional interests were implicated.
The study found that the management of oil resources is centralized in the Nigerian federal government, which also controls the collection and allocation of oil revenues, retaining the larger proportion and then distributing the rest to the other tiers of government. Thus, various regimes or administrations at the centre have exploited this centralisation of oil resources management to satisfy private and prebendal interests of the ruling class. This was evident in the manner in which national oil wealth is distributed to friends, relatives and cronies of those in power through patronage allocation of oil blocks.4 The politics of oil block allocation short-changed the Nigerian people by rewarding and empowering a selected group of highly connected individuals with millions of dollars-worth of oil wells because of their association with the leadership of the country. As a result, the oil block distribution formula inexorably converted national oil resources into private ownership as well as transferred wealth from the oil-producing region to the non-oil producing regions.5
The study also found that the Niger Delta environment has changed and continues to change rapidly with the expansion of the oil industry. Unsustainable oil extraction practices like canalisation, oil spillage, gas leaks and flaring, biodiversity depletion, and improper discharge of effluent have degraded the environment of the region. For instance, Nigeria flared about 24 billion cubic meters (or 0.84 trillion cubic feet) of associated natural gas every year in the region, which produces about 35 million tons of CO2 and 12 million tons of methane. Many oil communities have also experienced several incidents of oil spills that killed aquatic life and polluted farmlands. As a result, the local people have ended up frustrated both with the oil companies doing business in the region and the government agencies that failed to rigorously regulate them.6
The study further found that leakages occasioned by inadequate installation of metres to determine the actual volume of oil production, corruption and collusion between security agents and oil thieves, shortage of naval platform for surveillance and interdiction operation and poor coordination among maritime security agencies sustained illegal oil trade off Nigerian coastal waters. The result is that over 250 local and foreign vessels engaged in illicit transloading and transportation of stolen oil on the nation’s territorial waters, leading to an average loss of over 200,000 barrels of crude oil daily.7
The above findings clearly demonstrate that Nigeria is yet to achieve significant development despite enormous oil endowment beneath the bowel of the Niger Delta. Instead, the discovery of oil has brought about mounting corruption, ethno-regional competition and violent conflicts. While enormous petrodollar have entered the national coffers, the country in general and the oil producing communities of the Niger Delta rank as one of the poorest regions in the world. This unfortunate situation owe much to the manner in which oil resources have been (mis-)managed by successive administrations (military and civilian) in Nigeria. The oil sector has been reduced by the various regimes or administrations to an avenue for primitive accumulation of wealth. The civilian administration in power between 1999 and 2011 maintained the same pattern of allocation of oil resources like their military predecessors, in which oil resources were used to strengthen the wealth, influence and affluence of those in power, while excluding the citizens and their huge expectations.8 The expectations of Nigerians were that the inauguration of civil rule would mark a major departure from the way oil resource is managed, by enthroning transparency and accountability in the use of oil wealth to deliver the ‘dividends’ of oil endowment. This however has not been the case in the light of the February 2012 revelation of high-level graft in the management of oil wealth, especially the oil subsidy regime. The non-transparent and unaccountable management of resources have created room for chronic opportunism and criminality, particularly among oil host communities in the Niger Delta.9
