JUST IN: Group Reacts To Statement Made By Amayanabo Of Bakana On Niger Delta Pipelines Surveillance Contract, Describes His Statement As Untrue, Misleading And Targeted At Discrediting Tantita’s Outstanding Performance In Protecting The Oil Assets In The Region -

By Uche Alvin

OPEN PROTEST LETTER OF TOTAL DISAGREEMENT AND FACTUAL CORRECTION
TO THE STATEMENT ATTRIBUTED TO THE AMANYANABO OF BAKANA
ON PIPELINE SURVEILLANCE IN THE NIGER DELTA
DATE: 31/1/2026

From The Liberation National Developmental Force

We write this letter in open protest, deep dissatisfaction and moral anger over the recent statement credited to the Amanyanabo of Bakana calling for the so-called “decentralization” of pipeline surveillance contracts in the Niger Delta and directly targeting Tantita Security Services Limited. That statement, though clothed in royal language, is riddled with factual errors, selective memory and a dangerous misunderstanding of how oil theft was confronted and reversed in Nigeria.

Let it be said plainly: the crisis of crude oil theft in the Niger Delta did not arise because surveillance was centralized, nor was it defeated by scattering contracts to politically connected individuals. It was defeated when the Federal Government, acting through NNPC Limited and national security institutions, adopted a coordinated, intelligence-driven and results-based approach that finally confronted criminal oil theft networks head-on. Tantita Security Services Limited emerged in that context, not by sentiment, not by ethnic favour but by capacity, reach, local intelligence and verifiable results.

Before Tantita’s engagement, Nigeria’s crude oil production had collapsed to historically embarrassing levels. Pipelines were openly vandalized, illegal connections littered the creeks and the Nigerian state was losing billions of dollars monthly. These are not opinions, they are matters of public record acknowledged by NNPC Limited, security agencies and international energy observers. The idea that pipeline security was once “working” under fragmented local arrangements is a revision of history that insults Nigerians who watched the sector bleed for years.

The suggestion that Tantita “does not understand the peculiar security challenges of all oil-bearing communities” is either willfully misleading or deliberately dismissive of facts. Tantita’s operational model is built precisely on community-embedded intelligence, engagement with host communities, collaboration with the Nigerian Navy, NSCDC and other security agencies, and real-time surveillance across multiple states. It is this integrated framework, not isolated, localised outfits that led to the drastic reduction in large-scale crude oil theft and the recovery of national production capacity.

Equally troubling is the attempt to frame pipeline surveillance as an entitlement to be “shared” among prominent individuals, traditional rulers or regional actors. Pipeline surveillance is not a reward system, not a compensation scheme and not a royal patronage market. It is a national security function tied directly to Nigeria’s economic survival. Section 14(2)(b) of the 1999 Constitution makes it clear that the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government. Security contracts are therefore awarded on effectiveness and outcome, not on status or political balance.

The claim that oil theft and vandalism still occur and therefore justify dismantling the current framework is intellectually dishonest. No security system in the world guarantees absolute elimination of crime. The correct question is whether the scale, organisation and economic impact of oil theft have been reduced. The answer, acknowledged even by NNPC Limited, is yes significantly. Isolated incidents cannot be used to discredit a system that reversed a national catastrophe.

History must also be recalled honestly. The Niger Delta has suffered most not from centralized security but from years of fragmented control, compromised local arrangements and elite protection of illegal bunkering networks. The era when “everyone secured his own pipeline” was the era when crude oil theft flourished unchecked. Nigerians must not be pushed back into that chaos under the deceptive language of decentralization.

This letter must also state clearly that invoking the name of Bakana, Kalabari land or any Niger Delta community to advance an argument that weakens a functioning national security framework is unfair to the wider Niger Delta people who have paid with environmental destruction, militarization and poverty. The Niger Delta’s interest is not in multiplying contracts, it is in sustaining peace, protecting infrastructure, restoring the environment and stabilizing national revenue.

We therefore reject, in totality, the assertion that Tantita’s role constitutes monopolization in the negative sense implied. What exists is coordination, central accountability and measurable performance, the very things that were missing before.

To the Federal Government, the National Security Adviser and NNPC Limited, we state with firmness: do not be misled by narratives that romanticize decentralization while ignoring the hard lessons of the past. Weakening a system that is working, under pressure from sectional interests, would amount to institutional self-sabotage.

This protest letter is not written in defence of sentiment or personality. It is written in defence of facts, history and Nigeria’s economic security. The Niger Delta cannot afford another experiment built on appeasement. What the region needs is consistency, accountability and the strengthening, not dismantling of frameworks that deliver results.

Let the record stand corrected.

Sign:
Hon. Preye Davidson – Chairman

Dr, Festus Zion-owei – Secretary

The Liberation National Developmental Force

CC:

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu

National Security Adviser, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu

NNPC

Ijaw National Congress (INC)

Ijaw Youth Council (IYC)

PANDEF

Major National Media Houses