Oil Plunge Awakens Violence in Africa's Top Crude Producer
Almost seven years after an amnesty ended an era of bombings, kidnappings and theft, the Niger Delta is nervous once again.
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“General” Ramsey Mukoro opens a wad of cash and orders a double Hennessy before issuing his warning: the rebellion he was part of is threatening to return to the oil-rich Niger River delta.
Sipping the cognac from a gold-leaf glass at a mid-morning interview in a hotel bar in the southern Nigerian city of Yenagoa, Mukoro, the 33-year-old former militant commander, listed grievances that may return the delta to the violent days before a peace deal in 2009: unemployment, pollution and prosecution of top leaders of the insurgency.