Niger Delta Avengers threatens to resume hostilities

The Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) yesterday vowed to resume hostilities in the region, warning that unlike the 2016 operation, there will be casualties and that they will crush anything that stands on their way.

The group, in a statement by its spokesman, Murdoch Agbinibo, cautioned that they would not spare anything or anyone in their path to destroy the country’s economy by blowing up pipelines and oil installations.

The threat may not be unconnected with last Saturday’s aborted Port Harcourt meeting of the Pan Niger Delta Elders Forum (PANDEF) and the failure of Niger Delta elders to settle their differences.

The meeting of the E.K Clark led PANDEF scheduled to hold in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, was distrusted by Police, a development that anger many Niger Delta people.

“Our next line of operation will not be like the 2016 campaign, which we operated successfully without any casualties. This outing will be brutish, brutal and bloody, as we shall crush everything we meet on our path to completely put off the fires flairing gas in our communities and cut every pipe that moves crude from our region.

“We can assure you that every oil installation in our region will feel warmth of the wrath of the Niger Delta Avengers,” the statement reads.

They reminded the operators of the social media avengers that the NDA was not the same as the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), saying they were men of their words.

To all partners of government whose interest is the sufferings of the Niger Delta people, the Avengers are back and will not spare anything or anyone on our path to actualise a united and free Niger Delta.

“The high command of the Niger Delta Avengers wish to bring to the notice of the International Community and the general public that there is no such militant group with the name Reformed Niger Delta Avengers.

“It is not operated by any of our operatives but a money making tool in the hands of certain disgruntled Niger Delta political jobbers in connivance with top government functionaries of the President Muhammadu Buhari led government,” the statement added.