A prominent Niger Delta activist, Apostle Ezekiel Daniel Perela Osia, has formally dispatched a damning petition to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, alongside the diplomatic missions of Canada, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Australia, the European Union, Japan, South Korea, and Malaysia.

The urgent appeal calls for immediate international intervention regarding alleged human rights abuses, extrajudicial killings, forced labor, and systematic torture orchestrated by former militant leader Chief Government Ekpemupolo, widely known as Tompolo, and his private security firm, Tantita Security Services.

The petition paints a grim picture of a dramatic shift in power dynamic, recalling how Apostle Ezekiel once risked his own freedom to defend Tompolo against government persecution in 2015. 

The activist’s vocal opposition to state operations at the time resulted in his two-year detention in a underground facility operated by Nigeria's Department of State Services (DSS). 

Ironically, the same dialogue Osia championed while incarcerated eventually led the federal government to award Tompolo a lucrative, multi-billion-dollar pipeline surveillance contract in 2022, a position of immense influence that Osia asserts has transformed the former activist into an unchecked warlord.

At the heart of the atrocities is the riverine community of Oporoza in Warri South-West, Delta State, which the petition characterizes as a modern-day killing field and torture center. 

Osia alleges that Tompolo operates at least four private prisons where dissenting elders, women, and local youths are unlawfully detained for months. Under the command of enforcement operatives and notorious torture leads, victims are subjected to brutal physical assaults, including having pepper rubbed onto their bodies, prolonged beatings to the point of unconsciousness, and forced exposure to extreme environmental elements.

The petition further highlights grave violations of international law, specifically accusing Tompolo's syndicate of subjecting dozens of abducted citizens to forced labor. Notable cases include detainees Charles Korubo and Karowei Bala, who have reportedly been held in private cells since late 2024. 

Osia emphasizes that these practices directly contravene Article 4 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and multiple International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions prohibiting forced labor, noting that at least 33 youths from various Niger Delta states remain unlawfully captive in Oporoza.

Tragedy struck on January 15, 2026, when a young man named Patrick Peresuodel was reportedly abducted from his family home in Amassoma, Bayelsa State, by an operative associated with Tompolo’s network alongside four Civil Defence officers.

The abduction was triggered by a minor social media commentary criticizing the security firm's impact on the region. Peresuodel was beaten into critical condition and abandoned at a police facility, subsequently dying from his injuries at the Federal Medical Centre in Yenagoa. 

The perpetrator allegedly fled to Tompolo’s base to evade law enforcement, while a subsequent attempt to silence the victim's grieving family with a 50 million Naira payment was rejected.

Apostle Ezekiel forcefully critiques state security agencies, particularly elements of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps attached to Tantita Security Services—accusing them of acting as complicit enforcement tools rather than neutral law officers. 

He questions whether the scope of the federal government's pipeline protection contract legally or implicitly grants private security firms the authority to operate illicit detention facilities, execute extrajudicial arrests, and bypass national judicial processes entirely without government oversight.

Warning that he has now become a primary target for assassination due to his persistent advocacy, Osia urges foreign governments and international organizations to exert diplomatic pressure on the Nigerian presidency to dismantle these illegal operations. 

Expressing total readiness to testify before international tribunals, national assemblies, or global media, the activist accompanied his formal petition with flash drives containing victim testimonies and graphic photographic evidence detailing the human rights violations occurring across the region.