The joint operations of the United States Coast Guard and the US Navy have seized a Nigerian-owned supertanker, Skipper, following allegations linking the vessel to crude oil theft, piracy activities, and other cross-border crimes.
Aside from suspicion of stolen crude, investigators are probing the tanker’s alleged role in transporting hard drugs and its possible ties to a network reportedly financed by Iranian-linked and other Islamist-backed money-laundering groups.
The 20-year-old vessel, Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) bearing IMO Number 9304667 is said to be operated by Nigeria-based Thomarose Global Ventures Ltd., although documents list Triton Navigation Corp of the Marshall Islands as its registered owner.
Guyana’s Maritime Administration Department, MARAD, confirmed that the ship “is not on its registry and was using the Guyanese flag without authorisation.”
According to American security officials, the operation was executed under US law enforcement authority and publicly announced by President Donald Trump.
A search conducted at the Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, in Abuja showed Thomarose to be inactive.
The company’s listed address is 111 Jakpa Road, Effurun, Warri, Delta State, with registration number 1007876, although no contact numbers are associated with the firm.
Reacting to the development, the National President of OGSPAN, Mazi Colman Obasi, said: “I have never heard that Nigeria has a supertanker and that it is not active in CAC… the government and other agencies can do more.”
On his part, the President of the Centre for Marine Surveyors, Nigeria, Engr. Akin Olaniyan, said the situation raises questions about regulatory enforcement if the tanker indeed departed from Nigerian waters.
“If the vessel emanated from Nigeria, it suggests our Port State Control is practically non-existent… This issue has nothing to do with Nigeria as a country, but with regulatory enforcement,” he said.
NIMASA’s spokesman, Mr. Edward Osagie, said the agency had no official report yet and requested an official enquiry.
Veteran journalist and recipient of A.B.C Yola, Reporter of the Year Award (1997), Hassan Umar Shallpella, works with WAP as a Regional Correspondence. He was trained at Institute of Mass Communication and Technology Jos and Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria, Training School Lagos.He was a News desk Editor and a Correspondent at the Punch newspaper and till 2019, was the Deputy Editor ofThe Scope newspaper.
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