No fewer than 100 pieces of 50-litre jerry cans containing crude were recovered from 10 suspected pipeline vandals in Lagos.
The oil thieves who attempted to steal the crude from the sea in the state were arrested by men of the Nigerian Navy in the early hours of Sunday at the Single Point Mooring buoy, a Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited’s facility where tankers unload products, which are eventually transferred into tank farms for distribution.
Speaking on the development, the Commander, NNS BEECROFT, Kolawale Oguntuga, said they thieves would be handed over to the Area Commander of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, Musa Jubril for due diligence.
Oguntuga said, “In the early hours of Sunday, the technology electronically detected intruders on board the SBM operated by the NNPCL. Immediately a patrol team was activated and on getting there, 10 suspected vandals and oil thieves were found onboard this facility with divers’ equipment; pumping machines and hoses to steal crude products, and they were apprehended.
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“They were arrested around 2am on board the facility with over 100 pieces of 50-litre jerry cans. Some were already inside while others were on the boat controlling and channeling the hoses into the cans.”
Jubril of the NSCDC appreciated the Navy for the good work they had been doing, stressing that the agency will unravel the sponsors of the thieves.
In another news, two members of the Nigeria Referees Association (NRA) in Oyo State, Rafiu Opeyemi and Ibikunle Abiodun, were reported dead over the weekend.
The deaths of the two referees occurred within 24 hours.
Abiodun, who was until his death a member of the NRA in Akinyele Local Government Area, died on Friday following an illness. Opeyemi, a member of NRA in Ona Ara Local Government Area, died on Saturday in a motor accident in Osu, Osun State, while returning from Abuja, where he had participated in a national fitness test.