Pennington-Dodo-Ramos Salvation Front (Pendora), a group in Bayelsa State, has given itself 14 days to partner with freedom fighters in “suicidal” repeat attack on Bonga, Agbami and other oil fields if their operators SNEPCO (Shell) and Chevron-Texaco Nigeria Ltd refuse to sign MOUs with their host communities.
Comrade Perekunakuna Braun, the group’s Publicity Secretary in a statement regrets the planned violence but said patience had not paid for the Pendora communities he listed as Ezetu, Ekeni, Bilabiri, Amatu, Bissangbene, Letugbene, Orobiri, Azambiri, Ogbeintu and Agge, all in Southern Ijaw and Ekeremor LGAs in Bayelsa State .
Calling on the concerned oil companies to open discussions with their hosts under the watch of MEND and the Ijaw Youth Council (IYC), he asserted that despite shifts in references to Bonga Oil Field as being in the deep offshores of Lagos and then in Bayelsa by the media following attacks by General Boyloaf and MEND freedom fighters, the fact is that Pendora communities were the hosts that must be recognized for peace to reign.
“It is so sad and regrettable to note that about 105 Nigerians were (recently) sent to the Gulf of Mexico to acquire requisite skills to work on board the Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel stationed in Bonga field and are now currently on board the FPSO to the exclusion of the uncountable unemployed youths from the (host) communities that are roaming about in the streets of Yenagoa and Warri”, the statement lamented.
The group which commended and endorsed General Boyloaf’s 30-day ultimatum calling on the Bayelsa and Rivers State Governors to set up oil commissions added that it was necessary for oil and gas producing communities to do good service to the memory of Isaac Adaka Boro and Ken Saro-Wiwa by uniting in moral support of freedom fighters to confront the oil companies which it described as “the real enemies”.
