Delta clash claims life
2004-08-16 14:58
Lagos - A clash between rival political factions in a village in southern Nigeria's oil-rich Niger Delta has left one person dead, five seriously injured and 12 missing, police said on Monday.
Commissioner Charles Akaya, chief of police in Rivers State, told AFP that violence had erupted on Sunday between supporters of rivals for a chieftaincy title in the village of Ataba, in the coastal swamps east of Port Harcourt.
"There is a long-standing dispute there. The situation is being policed now, and an investigation is still ongoing," he said.
The Niger Delta, heartland of Africa's oil industry, has long been prey to factional violence, piracy and ethnic warfare.
A recent report by security experts commissioned by the Anglo-Dutch oil giant Shell estimated the annual death toll from the fighting at more than 1 000, a conflict on the scale of the guerrilla wars in Chechnya and Colombia.
Akaya said that Sunday's clash was limited to rival Ataba gangs, but local radio and press reports alleged that one of the factions has brought in heavily armed mercenaries from outside the area.