The leading militant group operating in the oil-rich region of southern Nigeria, the Niger Delta Avengers has disowned two new Twitter account that have sprung up follow the suspension of the group’s account.
The group says that the fake accounts are run by agents of the Muhammadu Buhari government who took advantage of the suspension of the group’s real account. “Please be mindful of these accounts,” the militant group said.
Micro-blogging website Twitter suspended the account of the Avengers for undisclosed reasons on Monday, July 4, 2016. The militant group says that its account was closed because it bridged the policy of the website.
“This, @NDAvengers, is the only twitter account we have and it under suspension by Twitter because we bridge their policy,” the militants said in a statement on its website.
“@Real_Ndavengers and @NDAvengers1 are all imposters and enemies of the [Niger Delta] region,” the group’s spokesperson, Mudoch Agbinibo, a militant brigadier general, said.
“The general public should not listen to those handles because they are government agents against our struggle.”
The Avengers shared screenshots of the fake accounts (below) which are sending out taunting messages to Twitter and also the Buhari government. One of the accounts has issued a set of tweets commenting on the political impasse in Abia State.
The Niger Delta Avengers announced a wave of attacks on 5 major pipelines and oil installations over the weekend. The group also announced Tuesday that it had blown up two pipelines, one belonging to Chevron Nigeria Limited and the other to state-owned oil company, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.
