Thirty-seven people are dead and several others are missing after inhaling crude oil fumes during an illegal loading operation at Okari Jetty in Okrika, Rivers State, in the early hours of Thursday. Locals put the death toll as high as 43, though 37 have been confirmed.
Around midnight, more than 200 youths from neighbouring communities arrived at the jetty in wooden canoes and locally-made boats. A vessel was already anchored there, loading petroleum product for export through a pipeline that runs from Indorama Eleme Petrochemical through the Port Harcourt Refinery.
The youths connected a pipe to an illegal tapping point on the same pipeline and began drawing crude into their containers simultaneously, confirmed Dr. Fyneface Dumnamene Fyneface, Executive Director of the Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre, YEAC-Nigeria, in a statement issued Thursday in Port Harcourt.
Barely 20 minutes into the operation, the pungent odour of the product, pumped at high pressure, overwhelmed the crowd. Some youths lost consciousness and fell into the river. Others collapsed where they stood, according to a fisherman who witnessed the incident from the beach.
“While a vessel was loading the product and the men were simultaneously loading into their waiting boats from the illegal tapping point, they inhaled the product being pumped at high pressure,” Dr. Fyneface said. “Many are still missing, and some corpses have been seen floating on the river.”
People from the upland area intervened to pull survivors from the water. Those who escaped the worst of the fumes suffered serious respiratory challenges and were taken to an undisclosed hospital in Port Harcourt, the fisherman told Daily Trust on condition of anonymity.
Rivers State Police spokesperson ASP Agabe Blessing Karbalo confirmed that the victims allegedly attempted to steal crude oil. “No official complaint has been received in connection with the incident at this time,” she disclosed. “Investigation is ongoing to establish the circumstances surrounding the incident and ascertain the facts.”
Oil and gas policy expert Charles Uzoma Ozoemena said the scale of the operation points to organised criminal networks, not just desperate youths. “Poor people don’t own ships,” he said. “The oil cartels own all these ships and boats that are used in loading illegally tapped crude oil from our system.”
Ozoemena urged the government to focus prosecution on the financiers behind oil theft rather than the youths at the bottom of the supply chain. “Thirty-seven lives wasted and those that survived are facing respiratory challenges,” he told reporters, adding that existing deterrents have clearly failed.
He questioned the record of prosecutions in the Niger Delta. “How many oil thieves have we jailed in the last 24 months? What are their punishments? Can we use some people as an example?” he asked, calling for tougher sentencing and stronger intelligence networks across oil-producing communities.
Tantita Security Services Nigeria Limited currently operates in parts of the Niger Delta, but Ozoemena said its coverage is insufficient. He proposed decentralising surveillance operations and incentivising community members to report illegal activity directly to security agencies before incidents occur.
Dr. Fyneface called on the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency to carry out a Joint Investigation Visit to the site. He also urged Indorama Eleme Petrochemical and other companies with vandalised facilities to immediately strengthen security across their pipeline networks to prevent any repeat.
The advocacy centre condemned the illegal operation but also pressed the government to create alternative livelihoods, including modular refineries and the proposed Niger Delta Industrial Park. “The government must provide alternative livelihood opportunities for displaced artisanal refiners,” Dr. Fyneface said.
Student activist Tams George, posting on Facebook shortly after the incident, blamed unemployment and poverty. “Many of our youths are desperately searching for opportunities to make a living,” he wrote, “but unemployment should never make us feel that our lives are expendable.”
Oil theft deaths at Okrika Jetty now rank among the deadliest single incidents of illegal crude loading recorded in Rivers State in recent years.
