The Nigerian Senate has opened investigations into claims that Cameroon has illegally annexed Nigeria’s mangrove and oil-rich islands in the once-disputed Bakassi Peninsula.
Local media have reported that the Senate has created an ad hoc committee to investigate the issue and submit a report within two months.
The Senate has also called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to take immediate action to protect Nigeria’s territorial waters and secure the country’s oil assets—more than 2,560 oil wells—located within the disputed mangrove islands in Akwa Ibom State.
This comes after the Senator for Akwa Ibom North-East, Aniekan Basse, accused Cameroon of encroaching into oil-rich islands located in Efiat, Mbo Local Government Area.
He stated that these territories do not belong to the areas ceded to Cameroon under the 1913 Anglo-German treaties or the International Court of Justice ruling from October 2002.
“These islands hold immense economic importance, containing over 2,560 oil wells and significant gas reserves that rightfully belong to Nigeria but Cameroon currently exploits due to this illegal annexation,” the senator said.
The Cameroon government has not reacted to the accusations by the Nigerian senate.
Cameroon and Nigeria have been coexisting peacefully since 2006, after Nigeria withdrew its troops from the Bakassi Peninsula, following a 2002 ICJ ruling that settled their ownership dispute of the peninsula.
The oil-rich peninsula was handed to Cameroon amid domestic backlash over the fate of thousands of Nigerians living there.
