The Ijaw Youth Congress (IYC), a socio-cultural group in the Niger Delta, has threatened to work against the operations of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) in the oiLlrich region if it goes ahead to acquire the $3 billion Afrexim Bank loan.

The group expressed fears that NNPCL while trying to re­pay the loan would deplete the oil reserves in the Niger Delta and further impoverish Nigerians.

The IYC, while issuing the warning in Port Harcourt the Rivers State capital over the weekend, called on President Bola Tinubu to stop the perfec­tion of the loan and avert a possible altercation between NNPCL and the Niger Delta youths.

Speaking on behalf of the youths, the National Secretary-General, IYC, Maobuye Obu, predicted that NNPCL would in the process of repay­ing the loan arm youths to kill themselves in pipeline protec­tion jobs.

He said: “What this would mean for the Niger Delta is that for NNPCL to maximize their production so as to repay the loan, they are going to create pipeline surveillance jobs and begin to arm our people to kill each other, or they would con­nive with NIMASA to bring in unknown vessels in the high seas to steal our oil.

“We are calling on President Ahmed Bola Tinubu to zero in on this and not allow NNPCL to bor­row this money, because as Niger Deltans, we cannot be paying for what we are not consuming.”

The youths expressed worry that NNPCL currently lacks the capacity to repay $3 billion worth of crude oil to AFREXIM­Bank in record time.

“If the NNPCL must go ahead to borrow this money, how many years have they agreed with AFREXIMBank to pay it back? Because if the price of oil at the international market is capped at $70 per barrel, it would take eight years, nine months for NN­PCL to be able to pay back con­sidering their maximum output and that’s not possible”. (Daily Independent)