For endless excuses in provision of power supply from the nearby oil facility, two oil producing communities, Tanbiri II, Biseni in Yenagoa have shut down oil production at Adibawa Oil field operated by the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC).
Business Hilights South South Bureau Chief gathered that the two oil wells, Adibawa well 4 and Adibawa well 10, feeding the Adibawa flow station were shut down by the protesters between Tuesday and Wednesday this week.
It was also gathered that hundreds of residents comprising youths, women and elders blocked the access road to the oil wells, for hours, singing solidarity songs amidst songs from local musical instruments.
In an interview, Youth President of Biseni Community, Oyeso Atena, noted that they were aggrieved over the inability of SPDC to link the community to a power plant located at Adibawa flow station in spite of several meetings.
According to him, “We took the step as a last resort following several talks; the oil firm had given us hope, but they later backed out by telling us that the transmission line to our community is not strong enough and cannot carry the power”.
“We have several oil wells here and merely shutting two of them have put the entire Adibawa flow station out of action and that shows that without the oil wells from here, the flow station cannot fire and we are just asking that they should give us electricity from that facility.
“We are not asking for too much for a company that has operated here since 1972 and there is no history of hostage taking, no attack on oil workers and no incident of vandalism of facilities.
“Our expectation is that they reciprocate our peaceful dispositions and not take our peaceful nature for weakness, we have vowed to remain here until they respond to us,” Atena averred.
