Dozens Killed in Crude Oil Explosion in Rivers State
The Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre (YEAC-Nigeria) through its Crude Oil Spill Alert System (COSAS) and members of its “One Million Youth Volunteers Network of Human Rights Defenders and Promoters in the Niger Delta” in Rumuekpe Community in Emohua Local Government Area has confirmed that there was explosion at a crude oil tapping point that has left many people dead.
The explosion happened at about 2AM on Friday, March 3, when one of the buses that was loaded with crude oil to drive to another area where the refining will take place in an artisanal refineries ignited his vehicle leading to the explosion.
The explosion and fire which has left dozens including women dead and burnt beyond recognition with many other vehicles and tricycles burnt to ashes at the tapping point which was on the Trans Niger Delta Pipeline (TNP) that passed through the community.
Fyneface Dumnameme Fyneface, executive director of YEAC-Nigeria, who has been campaigning against crude oil theft, environmental pollution and leading the advocacy for the provision of alternative livelihood opportunities for artisanal refiners in the Niger Delta for the past 12 years through the promotion of Modular Refineries promised by the federal government, made this known in a statement on Friday, March 3 which was made available to Realnews.
He proposed the establishment of “Presidential Artisanal Crude Oil Refining Development Initiative (PACORDI)” as was as the establishment of “Network Against Organized Crime in Nigeria and the Gulf of Guinea (NAOCINAG” was called and informed of this latest development and death of many pipeline vandals.
Fyneface said all those who were at the exact tapping point in the “pit” got killed while some of those who had loaded the crude and waiting to load including women have been killed by the explosion.
Advocacy Centre can conform from the eyewitness information and other sources that confirmed the incident at the community that men of the Nigeria Arm area already at the scene of the incident with the Police said to be on the way to the scene making it difficult for photographs and videos to be taken.
YEAC-Nigeria will update the public with photographs with this incident and more informing as they are received from the scene in the community.
