LAGOS, Nigeria, June 17 (UPI) -- U.S. oil giant Chevron has become the main target for Nigerian rebels in a campaign of violence in the oil-rich Niger Delta that has reduced output by nearly 1 million barrels of oil a day.
If the production cutbacks continue at the rate they have been in recent months, Nigeria, once Africa's largest oil producer, will face a serious economic crisis. The United States, a major customer of Nigerian crude, will see its fuel imports slump at a time when global demand makes it difficult to find alternative sources of supply.
Richard Moncrieff, West Africa director of the International Crisis Group, a Brussels think tank, recently warned that if no resolution to the conflict is found soon, "the Delta risks sliding deeper into conflict. Insecurity could spread further across the Gulf of Guinea." Other major producers in the region are Equatorial Guinea and the former Portuguese colony of Sao Tome and Principe.
The gulf has become a major oil production center. Most of its output from the deepwater fields is shipped directly across the Atlantic, primarily to the United States. As Middle East oil supplies become more problematic, the Americans are increasingly dependent on crude from the Gulf of Guinea.
The main Nigerian rebel group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, claimed Monday that it had blown up a Chevron pumping station. It was the fifth attack on the company in less than a month. MEND warned that its next target was Chevron's tank farm at the Escravos export terminal on the West African nation's Atlantic coast.
A May attack on a Chevron pipeline slashed output by 100,000 barrels a day, one-quarter of Chevron's Nigerian production. The violence has reduced Delta's daily output to 1.76 million bpd from 2.6 million in January 2006.
MEND warned that "after destroying the entire oil infrastructure in Delta state, the hurricane will move into the neighboring states of Bayelsa and Rivers before passing through the remaining states of Ondo, Edo and Akwa Ibom then finally head offshore."
Most of Nigeria's most productive wells in its southern oil region are offshore and are difficult to protect. Until a few months ago they had appeared immune from attack.
In 2008, 1,000 people were reported killed in the region. Federal officials reported that guerrilla attacks on oil installations cost around $20.7 billion, with oil worth a further $3 billion stolen.
The rebels claim they are fighting for a fairer distribution of the region's oil wealth among local tribes by the corruption-plagued federal government in Abuja, a major shareholder in Nigeria's oil industry. But their campaign of killings, kidnappings, sabotage and oil theft has often been little more than profit-driven criminality. MEND launched its campaign in 2004.
It claims the oil companies operating in Nigeria have been complicit in the corruption and the human rights abuses that have been carried out by government forces.
Earlier this month Shell Oil, one of several major oil companies alleged to have cooperated with Nigeria's former military government against the Delta campaigners, agreed to pay $15.5 million in a "humanitarian settlement" on the eve of an embarrassing U.S. lawsuit. One of the allegations was that the Anglo-Dutch oil giant, whose installations have been repeatedly attacked, was complicit in the execution of civilians by the regime.
On June 14 The Independent newspaper in London reported that confidential documents and court statements bolstered the allegations that Shell provided security forces with logistical support and aided security operations in Delta state.
MEND declared "all-out war" on the government in May, and the regime responded by launching its biggest military offensive in the south. But as Moncrieff of the International Crisis Group noted, since President Umaru Yar'Adua came to power in 2007 the government "response to the region's troubles has been incoherent, indecisive and unproductive."
