Two policemen and an officer the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) were, on Friday night, killed in an ambush by pirates on their way to Tebidaba Flow Station in Okoron, Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of Bayelsa State. Three other officers escaped with gunshot wounds.
The flow station is operated Nigerian Agip Oil Company (NAOC). Mr. Desmond Agu, NSDC Bayelsa State Commandant, confirmed the incident. It was gathered that though the security officers offered resistance, the superior firepower of the pirates overwhelmed them.
An NSCDC source told SaharaReporters that they got the news at about 9 pm on Friday.
"When we dispatched our security surveillance team to the area, we saw a military gunboat had arrived with some NSCDC personnel that escaped the attack. They seemed to have recovered the corpses of the killed security officers without their rifles. The pirates must have gone away with the guns," said the source. One of the survivors of the attack told SaharaReporters that the escort duty team were on their way from Koluama community before they came under attack. Sources blamed the attack on the refusal of the security officers to travel with a gunboat when on duty along the creeks and waterways of Southern Ijaw, Brass, Nembe and Ekeremor Local Government areas.
Last month, suspected militants ambushed and killed four soldiers and a civilian during an ambush along the waterways of Letugbene in Ekeremor Local Government Area of the state.
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