Nigeria's leading militant group warned that it is planning a full-scale attack on military bases and petroleum production centers in the oil-rich Niger Delta to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the president's inauguration.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta said that it would use car bombings and other forms of terror Thursday, marking one full year in office for President Umaru Yar'Adua.

"To commemorate the one year of failure by the government of Umaru Yar'Adua, MEND will carry out a string of deadly attacks and car bombings," the group said in a statement e-mailed to media outlets.

The advance warning, according to the group's statement, was to ensure that civilians avoid milling around oil pipelines so as to "minimize civilian loss of life."

Military officials in the delta said they are ready for a major assault by MEND, and foreign oil firms operating in the region said they would bolster their security as well.

Efforts by the Nigerian president to reach out to the militants, who are calling for a more equitable distribution of oil wealth among the nation's poor, have received mixed reviews over the last year.

Soon after his May 29, 2007, inauguration, Yar'Adua reached out to the militants and called for a truce, during which he promised to work on the problems plaguing the impoverished delta.

However, MEND and other armed groups soon lost patience with the president and waged an assault on the de facto capital of the delta, Port Harcourt, in September.

Since then, several efforts to broker a peace deal with the militants have been largely short-lived and ineffective, with attacks on oil and gas installations and pipelines increasing in recent months.

Nigeria, Africa's No. 1 oil producer, has pumped more than $300 billion worth of crude over the last three decades from the southern delta states, according to estimates. High unemployment in the delta, environmental degradation due to oil and gas extraction, and a lack of basic resources such as fresh water and electricity have angered the region's youth, who have taken up arms, many times supplied by political leaders, and formed militant groups and local gangs.

Despite the continuing unrest, there have been some positive reviews of Yar'Adua's first year in office.

"There is increasingly political stability. We are seeing an emphasis on rule of law and due process, because democracy and rule of law go together. It is very important," Jerry Gana, a leading member of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, said earlier this week.

Gana did note, though, that the Yar'Adua administration still needed to improve social services like water and power supplies in the delta and throughout Nigeria.

But others have less than glowing reviews for the first year of Yar'Adua's presidency.

"Our assessment of the one year of the Yar'Adua presidency is that we are still waiting for him to start," said Victor Umeh, national chairman of the opposition All Progressives Grand Alliance.

"We have not seen the major policy shift that has been geared toward alleviating the sufferings of the ordinary Nigerian."

Criticism aside, Yar'Adua did surprise a number of Nigerians last week when his administration announced it intends to employ the very same militants often blamed for attacks on oil installations in the Niger Delta to guard the region's oil pipelines.

In a surprising and certainly controversial move, defense officials said they would negotiate a possible protection agreement with militants.

"We will engage them to police oil pipelines, but they must first form themselves into limited liability companies for us to discuss with them," Nigerian Defense Minister Yayale Ahmed told federal lawmakers earlier this week.

The initiative, said Yayale, not only would help curtail attacks on oil installations in the delta carried out by armed groups, including rival militants, but also would prevent foreign oil companies from illegally "bunkering," or tapping into rival oil reserves.

"This will check the activities of even oil companies who cleverly engage in oil bunkering. We must fight criminality wherever it exists," the minister said.

Whether that proves true, Nigerian leaders will soon find out.

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