October 7,2008:
The new government announced it
had recovered $3.4 billion of embezzled government funds in the past 16 months.
The anti-corruption effort is very popular, and dozens of senior government
officials have been arrested and charged. In the last 37 years, the government
has earned over a trillion dollars ($1,190 billion) in oil revenue, most of which has
been stolen or misused. This corruption is the main cause of the unrest in the
country, especially the oil producing areas.
In the Niger
River delta, army and police operations over the last three weeks have
destroyed all known rebel (largely MEND) bases. It is believed that there are
dozens of unknown bases and safe houses. Several hundred rebels have been
killed or wounded so far, and over 500 arrested. During this offensive, the
troops have also shut down over a hundred oil theft operations (sites where a
pipeline was punctured and oil collected, or the barges that take the oil out
of the country). The oil is brought to barges or small tankers, where it is
taken to neighboring countries and sold, at a discount (50-70 percent off the
current world price), to brokers who sell it as legit stuff to refineries or
exporters. That's over a billion dollars a year coming back to dozens of gangs
in the delta. Army commanders have received death threats from gangster chiefs
who have had their smuggling operations damaged. No one is sure exactly how
much oil is stolen, or exactly how much cash the gangs get. But there are a lot
of gangs, and they have guns, speedboats, cell and satellite phones, luxury
cars and all manner of consumer goodies. Many gangsters have built impressive
looking houses (walled compounds in many cases), and some of these were raided
recently, as soldiers and police rounded up the usual (or at least known)
suspects. There's a lot of crime in the delta, not all of it oil related. There
are also many government officials on the gangsters payroll, and some of these
are being sought as well. The corrupt officials have a tendency to beat the
charges, eventually. But in the short term, politicians and civil servants get
arrested. Then they use lots of their ill-gotten gains to hire lawyers and bribe
members of the judicial system. Collectively, the corrupt officials are getting
organized and fighting back against the clean government movement.
October 2,
2008: Troops were sent to the southeast,
to stop five months of tribal violence (over land disputes). At least 18 people
have died, and many more wounded. Over the last decade, about a thousand people
a year have died in tribal strife, usually over land rights or leadership
disputes (who shall be the chief). When police appear unable to contain the
violence, the army is called in. This often leads to more deaths, as the army
tends to come in shooting.
September
30, 2008: The army has arrested several
hundred suspected rebels in the Niger River delta in the last week. This was in
response to earlier attacks on oil infrastructure which cut 40 percent of the
nations potential 2.5 million barrels of oil a day of shipments.