Tribal fighting between Ijaws and Itsekiri continues, with armed groups from each tribe raiding the others villages. The two tribes also compete with each other to run extortion scams on the oil companies running operations in the area.
The oil companies are being beset by more and more extortion and kidnapping attacks. The companies have always negotiated settlements, but have begun to threaten the use of mercenaries (implying that these will be former SAS troops).