Nigerian Leader Orders Pipeline Protection

ILADO, Nigeria – President Olusegun Obasanjo ordered stepped-up protection for pipelines after a gasoline blast killed up to 200 people, but Nigerians said Saturday that impoverished villagers would keep tapping the pipes to pilfer fuel.

Rescue workers tried to finish collecting the dead for burial in mass graves by sundown. But at least 22 charred bodies floated in the tidal mangrove swamps east of the main city of Lagos

Police said there was no sign that the fire at a ruptured pipeline was sabotage and they assumed villagers had punctured it to steal fuel. They said 150 to 200 people died in the flames when the gasoline ignited.

Obasanjo, who was on a state visit to Indonesia, ordered an investigation into the cause of the inferno, Radio Nigeria reported. He also called for increased protection of the country’s vast web of pipelines, the radio said.

AP