Yar’Adua calls for global clampdown on stolen crude oil

A statement from the State House, Abuja, quoted the president as saying that he would present a proposal to the UN, to seek urgent action by the international community to clampdown on the illicit trade in stolen crude oil.

Currently, Nigeria loses 190,000 barrels per day of crude to thieft, part of the proceeds of which are spent on criminal activities in the trouble oil bearing Niger Delta.

According to Freedom House, a United States based oil industry analysists, 10 percent of 1.9 million barrels per day produced by Nigeria one lost to thieves. Other estimates say the figure could be well higher.

Industry watchers told Business Day last night that the trade in stolen crude is a conspiracy among oil companies, government officials and criminals.

At separate talks with the Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda and the President of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, on the margins of the summit of the G-8 industrialised nations, Yar’Adua said that stolen crude oil ought to be treated globally in the same manner as stolen diamonds. "I appeal to you and through you to all other G-8 leaders to support my new proposal which I will discuss with UN Secretary General, that stolen crude should be treated like stolen diamonds, because they both generate blood money. "Like what is now known as ‘blood diamond,’ stolen crude also aids corruption and violence and can provoke war," the president said.

He said that in concert with ongoing efforts to holistically address the developmental

challenges of the Niger Delta, the government was taking steps to "dismantle the criminal dimension’’ of the problem in the region. He said crisis in the region was now being aggravated by some international cartels.