FOC warn officers against conniving with crude oil bunkerers in A’Ibom

The Flag Officer Commanding (FOC), Eastern Naval Command, Rear Admiral Atiku Abdulkadir on Friday warned men and officers of navy against conniving with oil bunkerers and crude oil theft in the state.
Abdulkadir gave the warning during an inspection tour of naval formations in Forward Operating Base (FOB), Ibaka, Mbo and NNS Jubilee, Ikot Abasi in Akwa Ibom. He explained that henceforth naval personnel who participates and connived with the oil theft and oil bunkering would be arrested and prosecuted.

“We should be very professional because there are few of us that are conniving with oil theft, please gentlemen things have change and we should try and stay away from illegality.
“We should realise that there is zero tolerance for illegality, you must be very professional and understand the concept and all directives that you are given and do them as directed,’’ he said.
He said that Nigerian Navy was collaborating with sister agencies to increase arrests of oil bunkerers and zero activities of oil theft in its area of operations.
“Officers should be limited to only what is moral and what is legal, if you conduct anything that is outside what is expected to do, they are going to reports and affect your arrest,’’ he said.
He noted that any officers who arrests bunkerers would be commended and appreciated.
Abdulkadir advised men and officers of the command to see themselves as pathfinder of the crusade of oil theft in the country.
He called on the navy to be at the fore front and also doing more of the arrest.
“We must be seen to be as the pathfinder of this crusade because it is in our own natural domain, we should be the one at the fore front and be seen doing more of the arrests.
He lamented the high rate of sea robbers in the water ways while calling for heavy presence of naval officers in the creeks and water ways to end sea robbery in the state.
“There have been incident of sea robber in our environment, the safety movement in the waterways, hinder businesses and other activities that our brother conducts in the water ways.
 ”We must brass up and make maximum presence at sea at difference check point in order to bring safety in the water ways and creeks,’’ Abdulkadir said.
He stressed on the importance of professionalism of officers and men of Nigerian Navy to their duties.
He decried that situation where navy personnel’s escort vessels in their area of operations.
“It is so sad that we have our personnel on board escorting vessels, only to get the sad news that some criminals have got on board and they shot some people and some of our personnel are part of the casualty,’’ he said.
Our Correspondent reports that the FOC visited Navy out-post in Ikuru town, ExxonMobil, ALSCON Jetty.