The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has described piracy and other criminal vices in the nation’s waterways as a threat to the corporation.
This is as the corporation said the nation lost about $750 million to oil theft in 2019.
The amount is about N230 billion at the official CBN exchange rate of N306 to $1.
This was contained in a statement by the NNPC Acting spokesman, Samson Makoji, on Wednesday.
The Group Managing Director, Mallam Mele Kyari, was quoted to have stated this during a presentation to members of the Executive Intelligence Management Course 13 of the National Institute for Security Studies (NISS) who visited his office.
Kyari noted that any threat to the corporation’s operations was a direct threat to the very survival of Nigeria as a nation because of the strategic role of the corporation as an enabler of the economy.
The GMD listed other security challenges facing the corporation to include vandalism of oil and gas infrastructure and kidnapping of personnel, adding that there was a deep connection between the various shades of insecurity challenges as they are all linked to what was happening in the Gulf of Guinea and the entire maritime environment.
He called for a concerted effort and synergy to secure oil and gas operations for the economic survival of the country.
Also speaking, the NNPC Chief Operating Officer, Downstream, Engr Yemi Adetunji, said in 2016, the Gulf of Guinea accounted for more than half of the global kidnappings for ransom.
He noted that out of 62 kidnap cases globally, 34 involved seafarers.
Adetunji, however, stated that the NNPC was working closely with security agencies to tackle the security challenges, and cited the “Operation Kurombe” that was recently conducted by the Nigerian Navy at the Atlas Cove as an example of such collaborative efforts.