Things continue to escalate in the Niger Delta. All pilots should be very careful
Three kidnapped Filipino workers who were kidnapped 10 days ago on Bonny Island were released this morning.
However, several expatriates (numbers as yet unknown, some sources saying 4, others as many as 15) were kidnapped from a well known karaoke bar in Port Harcourt last night. Many shots were fired and one of the hostages is reported to have been injured. Reports are confusing, but there was a lot of shooting outside Agip along the fence between Agip and UST, during which one MOPOL was critically injured (and remember that a number of MOPOL were killed inside the Agip base 6 months ago). The firing may have been the kidnapped expatriates being taken to Eagle Island so they could be removed in boats as seems to be the norm at present.
Control Risks advises against non-essential travel to the Niger delta, where security and travel risks are rated at HIGH. The security environment in the region will remain volatile and further militant attacks, including kidnaps, are possible. An escalation in attacks across the region is expected ahead of the elections scheduled for 2007. Companies are advised to implement
maximum security measures, including reviewing and updating evacuation procedures in Rivers, Delta and Bayelsa states.
Hopefully Bristow and CHC will now start to really take the security of their staff more seriously. We are an important ingredient in Nigeria's largest assett, so maybe the Nigerian government should also start thinking seriously about our protection in the cities as well as at the flow stations (okay, I know, fat chance
). Think twice before you venture out after dark. I expect most companies will ban movement of expatriates outside compounds at night anyway, and yet again the terrorists will have succeeded in making our lives more dangerous, miserable and uncomfortable. If so, companies like Bristow and (even more) CHC must do more to make life inside camps and compounds more bearable in terms of leisure facilities and/or pay considerably more danger pay (or whatever they want to call it) than they do now. It may not be called civil war here yet, but it sure as hell is some kind of a war zone
