The Rivers state command of the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) on Monday nabbed a syndicate of pipeline vandals that specialised in siphoning fuel from a major Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation’s (NNPC) pipeline at Ogali Eleme area of the state.
Daily Trust reports that the NNPC pipeline supplies fuel to Aba, Enugu and Makurdi.
Conducting journalists round the vandalised fuel pipeline on Monday, the Assistant Commandant-General of NSCDC, Muhammed Haruna, said the syndicates who operate from a residential building dug a tunnel from where they connect a hose to NNPC fuel pipeline that supplied the product into storage tanks installed in the residential building.
He said: “We had an intelligence report that NNPC fuel pipeline was breached. We came here and discovered that some syndicates that specialized in vandalising fuel pipeline intercepted a major pipeline supplying fuel to Aba, Enugu and Makurdi.
“They dug a tunnel from where they connect a hose to the pipeline that transports fuel to other part of the country. They connect the hose through a tunnel to GP tanks installed inside the building. The hose transports PMS from the pipeline through the tunnel to the tanks.
“This act of economic sabotage was concealed in an uncompleted building inside a residential building. Nobody would have suspected that such criminal activities were going on there until it was discovered.”
He said one of the key suspects has been arrested while the Command is on the trail of others.
He added that the entire premises where the criminal activities were carried out has been sealed by the command.
The General Maintenance Supervisor of UTM Offshore, the organization monitoring the pipeline, Abel Johnson, confirmed the vandalism and arrest.
