OGONI… …The Unending Decimal

THE Ogoni crisis has simply refused to dissipate. The late military Head of State, General Sani Abacha had thought the shortest route around the problem was to dispatch some Ogoni leaders. How wrong! Abacha would have acted differently if he had had the full picture that merely killing Ken Saro-Wiwa and his eight compatriots was not going to settle the matter.

Also, Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC), whose inordinate quest for Ogoni oil defines all the dimension of the crisis, would have invented a more creative way of framing the issues instead of aligning with the Federal Government to apply a Nazist Final Solution to an injury that required systematic healing. Nothing told the giant crude hunter that its characteristic divide and rule approach, which pitches brothers against brothers in the Niger Delta was going to fail the Ogoni litmus test.

As it has since turned out, Ken and the eight others were killed for nothing. If anything, their execution pushed the matter off the negotiation table deep into the trenches. But in the standoff, which has lasted 17 years, the people followed most religiously the nonviolent prescriptions of Saro-Wiwa. No shooting of guns, no blowing of pipelines but through sheer soul force, they have been able to hold their ground against successive governments and Shell Petroleum. It is also the reason why the Ogoni nut has proved so difficult to crack.

The opposite side does not have a counter plan in this battle of the indomitable spirit. If it were a hot war where guns and bombs are the determiners, perhaps the Ogonis would have been overwhelmed and pounded to submission by government superior firepower. But they hold the aces and have managed to set the rules in this war of attrition. It is in their interest to stick to this war plan. Ogoni remains the only oil producing community that has successfully stopped all forms of exploratory activities without firing a gun, but through a sustained advocacy that has made far more impact than a thousand guns and bombs.

Shell Petroleum, which once upon a time sounded as a conqueror of the Ogoni people had since bitten the humble pie and has been frantically searching for ways to re-enter Ogoni and resume operations. Its disused facilities are scattered across the land. Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah tried but failed to broker a deal with his mediation on the crisis. Among the people, there is great joy in keeping Shell at bay. In fact, they say any other oil company is welcome to continue business in Ogoni land. One folklore in the community has it that a curse was tied to a broom with which Shell was metaphorically swept away and that only Saro-Wiwa knows where the broom is kept and to reverse the curse, Saro-Wiwa must be resurrected and asked to produce the broom.

Even when the oil had stopped flowing in Ogoni Land, all the issues surrounding its exploitation and accruing benefits are so much alive. The people still insist that a lot is required from the Federal Government and Shell Petroleum to restore the ravaged land to baseline conditions. They say the government and Shell connived to steal crude oil worth over $40 billion from Ogoni land in the last 60 years.

More worrisome however is that the new generation is talking faster and tougher than how Ken Saro-Wiwa carried on. The Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), which has been articulating the Ogoni position since the time of Saro-Wiwa along peaceful lines is growing impatient of the unending dialogues and pushing for something more decisive.

The report of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) on Ogoni has come in the heat of the matter to create further basis for anger. Two weeks ago, a faction of the movement represented by one Tambari Deeker, proclaimed the independence of Ogoni land. This is a big leap beyond the parameters set by the Ogoni Bill of Rights, which only seeks adequate local participation in the exploitation and utilization of resources domiciled in Ogoni land within the Nigerian federation.

The fellow said, “the urgency behind the declaration is that self-government for Ogoni was overdue in view of many important issues bordering on indigenous rights of the Ogoni people being tampered with now” stressing, “the UNEP’s Ogoni Report is one out of many.”

The 20-point bill is caped as thus: “while reaffirming our wish to remain a part of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, we make demand upon the Republic as follows:

That the Ogoni people be granted POLITICAL AUTONOMY to participate in the affairs of the Republic as a distinct and separate unit by whatever name called, provided that this Autonomy guarantees the following:

• Political control of Ogoni affairs by Ogoni people;

• The right to the control and use of a fair proportion of OGONI economic resources for Ogoni development;

• Adequate and direct representation as of right in all Nigerian national institutions;

• The use and development of Ogoni languages in all Nigerian territory;

• The full development of Ogoni culture;

• The right to religious freedom; and

• The right to protect the OGONI environment and ecology from further degradation.

“We make the above demand in the knowledge that it does not deny any other ethnic group in the Nigerian Federation of their rights and that it can only conduce to peace, justice and fair play and hence stability and progress in the Nigerian nation.

“We make the demand in the belief that, as Obafemi Awolowo has written: In a true federation, each ethnic group no matter how small, is entitled to the same treatment as any other ethnic group, no matter how large.

We demand these rights as equal members of the Nigerian Federation who contribute and have contributed to the growth of the Federation and have a right to expect full returns from that Federation.”

Far-reaching as these may seem, they appear very stale in the light of the new push for complete autonomy by the MOSOP faction. Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi has dismissed the move as untenable, saying political autonomy is not achieved through newspaper and radio announcements.

“Let the man who declared autonomy come out on the road and see whether he will get autonomy,” he said. But deep inside, Governor Amaechi must be very worried by the sudden change of method by a people whose nonviolent approach he once adopted, amid rising violence and bare face criminality, as the best in the so-called struggle for the emancipation of the Niger Delta.

And this is precisely why the MOSOP declaration calls for a more technical review. The group could be saying also that the various channels established by government, namely Amnesty Programme, The Ministry of the Niger Delta and even the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), to take succor to the people of the Niger Delta are operating in exclusivity and completely outside the guidelines.

For instance, in the Amnesty Programme, what is rather outstanding is the high premium placed on violence with the result that what one gets from the multi-billion naira initiative is commiserate with one’s capacity to wreak violence on the system. What was intended, by the Federal Government, as a social and economic remediation package for the ecologically ravaged region is gradually derailing into a goldmine for a tiny vocal elite and the top leadership of sundry youth and armed groups.

It explains why violence agitations have not been completely stemmed in the region in spite of official efforts to maintain peace. The Ogoni declaration is therefore part of the growing new threat to oil production, which, before the demobilization and disarmament of armed fighters in the Niger Delta, had descended to an all-time low of about 1000 barrels per day (bpd).

Output has since peaked, averaging at about 25000 bpd to meet the production quota prescribed for Nigeria by the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

In the ensuing good times, government has apparently gone to sleep, thinking that all of the complex issues of resource ownership and allocation of accruing benefits in the Niger have been settled with the mere proclamation of unconditional freedom for armed youths that were fighting the state to gain a foothold.

The questions are far from being answered and even more people than ever are growing angry. The Isokos, Itsekiris, Urhobos, Binis and even a section of the Ijaws are angry that the political ascendancy of the region in the centre has not meant better life across board. They say where it has been expedient to act decisively, like the full implementation of the report of the National Technical Committee on the Niger Delta headed by MOSOP leader, Ledum Mitte, the Federal Government has, at best, prevaricated.

Things are sliding dangerously. Instead of moderate demands, ethnic groups across the land are pushing maximalist positions. The radical Islamic sect, Boko Haram for instance, is seeking the Islamisation of a country where more than 70 per cent of the population subscribes to different faiths. The North and the Southeast are laying undiluted claim to the presidency in 2015 and both regions are sounding as if their continued faith in the country is completely dependent on the realization of that claim. The Ogoni has added a dimension and theirs is coming from a constituency that should give the President the least worry.

It returns the question to the starting point. All groups, beginning from the far North through the Middle Belt down to the South-south are seeking to escape from the imaginary oppressors of the Nigerian State. Who are then the overlords in a federal configuration, where everybody is claiming an underdog status? The push for a new constitution offers a redemptive window to resolve the contradictions and keep Nigeria one. This is why the assignment must be taken most seriously by both the oppressed and the oppressors.

Source: The Guardian Nigeria

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