Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), Rivers State Command, says it has burst a syndicate at Ogali Eleme which specialises in siphoning fuel from a major Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) pipeline that supplies fuel to Aba, Enugu and Makurdi.
NSCDC Assistant commander, Muhammed Haruna, while briefing journalists on the discovery in Eleme, said the syndicates which operated from a residential building, dug a tunnel from where they connected a hose to NNPC fuel pipeline that supplied the product into storage tanks installed in the residential building.
According to him: “We had an intelligence report that NNPC fuel pipeline was breached. We came here and discovered that some syndicates that specialized in vandalising fuel pipelines intercepted a major pipeline supplying fuel to Aba, Enugu and Makurdi.
“They dug a tunnel from where they connected a hose to the pipeline that transports fuel to other parts of the country. They connected the hose through a tunnel to GP tanks installed inside the building. The hose transports PMS from the pipeline through the tunnel to the tanks.
“This act of economic sabotage was concealed in an uncompleted building inside a residential building. Nobody would have suspected that such criminal activity was going on until it was burst.”
