LAGOS (Reuters) - An oil flowstation operated by Italian firm Agip in southern Nigeria has been shut down after a night-time raid by unknown attackers, police said on Wednesday.
The attackers targeted the Ogbabiri flowstation in Bayelsa state in the Niger Delta, the police commissioner of the state told Reuters. He did not have any information on whether any oil output was affected.
"It happened at 2 a.m. (0100 GMT). The flowstation has been shut. Military security was driven out of there," Hafiz Ringim said by telephone from the Bayelsa state capital Yenagoa.
An spokesman for Agip, a unit of Italian company Eni, declined to comment.
Alfred Ilogho, commander of the armed forces in the western Niger Delta, said he had received information suggesting the attack stemmed from a dispute between the local community and Agip.
"It has to do with the community and the company maybe not meeting their demands," he said. However, he said that Ogbabiri is not in his area of responsibility and the army spokesman for the eastern delta was not reachable.
Disputes between oil firms and local residents demanding jobs and investments for their communities are frequent in the Niger Delta. Companies often sign memoranda of understanding with what they call "host communities" and disputes tend to arise when the residents feel promises have not been kept.
A quarter of Nigerian oil output has been shut down since February following a wave of attacks on oil facilities by militants demanding greater local control over oil revenues and compensation for environmental damage.
The country is the world's eighth biggest oil exporter and Africa's biggest producer.
There was no indication on Wednesday of any link between the attack on the Agip flowstation and the campaign of attacks by the militant Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND).
Reuters