Nigeria- Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND)

TCL, TRO, MIL, CYL

Description of Organization
a. Who are the leaders?
• Spokesman “Jomo Gbomo,” real name Henry Okah(?), permanent residence in South Africa
• “Major-General Godswill Tamuno”
b. What issues do they care about?
• 1) Community compensation from energy companies; 2) autonomy over the region’s resources; 3) economic opportunities for local communities; and 4) the release of Ijaw community leaders from prison.
• In a statement released January 11, 2006, MEND said, "Our aim is to totally destroy the capacity of the Nigerian government to export oil... it must be clear that the Nigerian government cannot protect your [oil companies] workers or assets. Leave our land while you can or die in it."
c. What does the organizational structure look like?
• Hierarchy, but leaders are frequently replaced due to internal strife and the “semi-democratic tradition” among Ijaw to rotate leaders.
• MEND also claims to have infiltrators within the Nigerian military

Financial Resources (if applicable)
a. List activities that generate cash flow
• Siphoning oil (“bunkering”) to sell on the black market
• Armed robbery
• Extorting payoffs from government and private firms through abduction of employees or sabotage of equipment
• Possible remittances from the UK and the US
b. Income from activities
• All Niger delta militants: Oil siphoning “is a racket estimated to be worth several billion pounds a year.”
c. Profitability
• “200,000 and 300,000 barrels of crude oil, 10–15% of daily production, was being siphoned off illicitly from pipelines and loaded into sea vessels for sale abroad; this represented a loss of $3.5 billion a year.”

Military Resources (if applicable)
a. What arms do they possess
i. What type?
• Small arms: revolvers and self-loading pistols; rifles and carbines; submachine-guns; assault rifles; light machine-guns.
• Bladed Weapons: knives, bow and arrows, machetes.
• Light weapons: heavy machine-guns, AK-47s, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, anti-aircraft guns.
• Improvised Explosives Devices (IED): explosives and car bombs.
• Satellite phones
ii. How much? Not known but MEND says its 5000 members are all armed
iii. “Observers are taking MEND seriously. The militiamen boast of an arsenal including heavy M-16 guns and more serious weaponry than any other Nigerian militias to date. Their 400-horsepower boats are faster than Nigerian Navy craft.”
26. Provide a short history of the stakeholder group
a. MEND appeared in January 2006, so they are the newest but most organized of the Niger Delta militias. MEND has recently made efforts to strengthen its cause by supporting other militia groups. It has supplied arms, swift boats and men to the Niger Delta Vigilante Movement, and through extortion also demanded (and obtained) the release of the leader of the Niger Delta People's Volunteer Force.
b. Fatalities & kidnappings as a result of total militant conflict:
• 2007: 194 fatalities, 172 expatriates and 54 Nigerians kidnapped
• 2006: 80 facilities
• 2005: 125 fatalities
• 2004: >500 fatalities, 800,000 displaced
• 2003: <200 fatalities<br />• 2002: 100 fatalities
• 2001: >20 fatalities
c. What are their future goals?
• The Delta has “been exploited for the benefit of other parts of Nigeria and foreign companies and [Mend] orders all oil companies and Nigerians whose roots lie elsewhere to leave the region.”
• “Our goal remains to paralyse 100 per cent of Nigeria's oil export in one swoop."