Like Boko Haram, New Suicide Militant Group, NDSS Springs Up In Niger Delta, Issues 7 Days Ultimatum

At this critical time of the nation in all facets, economy, insecurity the worst, another militant christened New Delta Suicide Squad, NDSS has emerged, thereby compound the woes already been suffered by Nigeria and Nigerians, News Punch has learnt from a reliable source

The group, as its name suggests could engage in suicide bombing like the dreaded Boko Haram,

The new group emerging just as the Federal Government finding means to quell the activities of the Niger Delta Avengers of bombing the nation's major oil facilities, the new suicide militant group  has threatened to destroy the equipment of private oil firms’ installations in the Niger Delta re­gion, issuing 7 days ultimatum to all private oil companies to quit, The Authority Newspaper reports.

The announcement of the group came on the heels of Pres­ident Muhammadu Buhari’s threat in a national broadcast to mark his first anniversary in of­fice, to crush the upsurge in mil­itancy in the Niger Delta which has crippled Nigeria’s oil produc­tion. 

It said failure to comply with the deadline, the owners of such facilities stood the risk of losing their investments.

In a statement issued on Monday by the spokesman of the group according to The Authority Newspaper, Harry Ebiye, he said: “The New Niger Delta Suicide Squad warns all owners of tank farms, storage tanks and private jetties to quit the region within the next seven days beginning from the date of this publication or risk the destruction of all their facil­ities from the date of the expira­tion of this ultimatum.

“The exploitation of this re­gion by scavengers, economic pi­rates, and cowboys must come to an end” Ebiye said.

Our source learnt that top officials of the Federal Gov­ernment are divided over how to handle the current attacks on oil installations in the Niger Delta by militants.

A meeting with representa­tives of top militants in the region, reportedly organised last week by the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) on how to con­tain the security problems in the Niger Delta, ended in a deadlock.

One camp had reported­ly broached the idea of using a former South-South governor to reach out to the militants but shelved the idea when it was real­ised that the former governor did not have the required clout and contacts amongst the militants.

Another issue being report­edly considered is that of the de­tention for over 70 days, without trial, of Azibaola Roberts, a cous­in of former President Goodluck Jonathan, by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

Ironically, Roberts is being held by the EFCC for a $40 mil­lion contract to secure oil pipe­lines during the Jonathan admin­istration. Some security sources hinted on the possibility of the government engaging Roberts to negotiate with the militants cur­rently destroying oil pipelines in the region, since he had success­fully handled such projects before on behalf of the government.

An EFCC source hinted that they did not have sufficient evi­dence to charge Roberts to court, but that having detained him for over 70 days, the commission may be left with no option than to charge him to “any court, just to save face.”