Workers in the oil and gas industry under the auspices of the Producers Forum of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) have revealed that Nigeria loses between $15 million and $25 million daily to oil theft.
The forum has therefore called on the government to equip the security forces to be able to fight the crime headlong.
Emmanuel Onuorah, chairman of the forum, put the quantity of the crude theft at about 250kbpd and 400kbpd from pipeline vandalism, which is the combined production of Ghana, Gabon and Equatorial Guinea.
Onuorah said at a forum in Lagos last weekend that “if the crude oil price is put at an average of $60/barrel, this translates to between $15 million and $25 million lost in revenue.
As a major stakeholder in the industry, we lament the huge loss, which could have been deployed into critical areas of national development.
“Huge unbudgeted costs are being incurred to repair or replace pipelines at damaged/theft points. Government needs to develop the political will to stop pipeline vandalism and oil theft, including sanctioning collaborators in the military and security services.
“The security forces should be empowered by government to secure our national assets instead of the use of unconventional methods through award of contract to those without security and intelligence know-how to protect these critical national assets.”
Listing some of the evils of pipeline vandalism and crude oil theft, he said pipe- line vandalism was a key cause of massive divestment by the International Oil Companies (IOCs) since 2010, adding that the criminal activities had also forced refineries to shut down since the feedstock was always truncated.
“Pipeline sabotage has continually strained Nigeria to resort to importation of petroleum products and waste the limited resources meant for capital and human development programmes.
“Regrettably, sabotaged pipeline is the major reason for spillages and environ- mental devastation set- ting the host communities against both the oil operators and the government.”