13-02-09 Nigeria loses $ 17.8 bn on the average, annually, to crude oil theft as a result of lack of security in the nation's territorial waters.
This was disclosed by Mr Olisa Agbakoba, a maritime lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) at this year's lecture and maritime recognition awards of the Nigerian Chamber of Shipping (NCS), where he also called for a review of the Nigerian shipping policy.

Agbakoba's disclosure came on the heels of declaration of a force majeure by Shell, warning that unrests in the Niger Delta meant it may be unable to meet some oil export obligations from its Bonny terminal for the rest of this month and next. This will further jeopardise Nigeria's earnings from oil and the 2009 budget which was based on $ 45 per barrel of crude.
Agbakoba noted that the government has not been able to police the country's territorial waters and this has given room for the large theft of the country's crude. He explained that the activities of the oil thieves which takes place between 50 and 100 nautical miles in the nation's territorial waters is unbelievable.

His words: "Our water jurisdiction is very large, it starts from the internal waters right up to the EEZ (Exclusive Economic Zone), but what we are not doing effectively is policing our waters. The internal waters we police, but in the deep sea where all the action takes place, there is nobody, no security, so, what is happening is that our oil is stolen and government knows that."
"Even today, it was reported that there was a consignment of crude found, waiting for ships to come."

Police our territorial waters
He suggested that the only way to stop the massive theft of the nation's crude is to revamp the country's maritime institutions, adding that if the internal waters are controlled by the National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA), there should be an agency that patrols the territorial waters for security purposes. Agbakoba, a former president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) wondered that if the Nigerian Maritime Administration of Safety Agency (NIMASA) is only in charge of safety, then who takes care of the nation's territorial waters?
"The internal waters is controlled and regulated by NIWA, the territorial waters, nobody controls it; the function of NIMASA is maritime safety, but in other countries, you must have maritime security. That is where the coast guard comes in so that when enemies approach your waters, you can easily detect them. We have no naval capacity on the water ways, we have no ocean policy, so the water ways are very open."

Agbakoba also disclosed that a lot of Chinese and Indian fishing trawlers come into the country and cart away prawns, shrimps and other sea products because of the lax security in the territorial waters.
"Government must have a sense of urgency, a sense of direction and action, that is what governance is all about because what we are saying here has been said long before now", he added.

Shell declares force majeure
At the moment, oil prices have come down to $ 38 per barrel and production has dropped to about 1.53 mm per day as a result of the activities of militants that have made the Niger Delta region insecure for oil production. Meanwhile, Shell, a major oil producer and exporter has warned that it will not be able to meet supplies to consumers as a result of militants' activities, meaning Nigeria's hope of meeting the revenue projection for 2009 has been further dimmed.
Shell said that it had declared a force majeure on its Bonny oil shipments with effect from February 10 because of "logistics challenges" caused by insecurity in the Niger-Delta.

It will be recalled that it had only lifted a previous force majeure which frees it from contractual obligations on Bonny Light shipments from Nigeria just recently. Shell's latest action, it was learnt, will affect the remainder of February and perhaps March with some probably deferred to April. An earlier force majeure covering Bonny Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) is still in place,the company said.
The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), the main militant group in the region, called off a five-month-old ceasefire recently and warned of renewed assaults on oil and gas facilities in the country.