it's about a 30-minute boat ride from the nearest village past the dead or dying mangroves of the Niger Delta soil polluted creeks hidden inside the mangrove swamps we come across this an illegal or refinery one of many illicit operations in this part of Nigeria some of these men say they have college diplomas and university degrees but they can't find work good good health as we are living now there's no book health there is no good Hospital there's no good pub on water in our villages there is nothing that you are doing a lot of us
we realize a lot of poverty in our village most of the stolen crude oil is shipped offshore some is refined locally if this the mates of thousands of Nigerians engaged in a practice locally known as oil bunkering they're hacked into pipelines to steal the crude oil and then sell it they say this is not stealing they're just taking what they insist is rightfully theirs dick Hayes our drilling by the big oil companies has poisoned the waters of the Delta dig Barrow Solomon's his fishermen who used to rely on the waters for a livelihood had been
getting poorer and poorer he feels for many years now the people in the iguana region had been marginalized by the federal government and that's why they are fighting back in the only way they see they can by taking some of the riches for themselves but it has risks nobody like oh yeah the truth they have been summaries and the situation in the region remains unstable these illegal refined products are sold at the international waters for in exchange for small arms that's why there's a proliferation of arms in the $90 an Nigeria's oh and the security
forces are complicit seriously complicit in all that is taking place they are the ones that give this people protection security forces often patrol and God oil pipelines they deny being involved in the illegal activities mandate is to protect the pipeline and that is our job in our own kids who are very steadfast in the Constitution maintaining protecting the pipeline we don't compromise and I don't see any of his are compromising and in the event that anybody does that at all you'll be metal with the highest punishment that the the the the core set out to
the losses on that velocity for a region rich in oil and gas there will be people who feel they are not benefiting and that will only raise tensions further harder Matassa al-jazeera in the Niger Delta
