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Battle of the Niger Delta
OKENWA ENYERIBE
CONTROL of
the rain and swamp forest belt of Nigeria which habours abundant crude oil and
natural gas — Nigeria’s prime foreign exchange earner — has now assumed a new
disastrous dimension of incessant killings under Asari Dokubo, a university
drop-out and creek warlord, prompting the Nigerian government to engage him in a
peaceful dialogue.
The bone of contention is not principally
the control of crude oil drilled in the Niger Delta; after all, before the
discovery of oil in 1956, at Oloibiri, the Ijaws and other nationalities in the
area were surviving on other economic activities like fishing and trade in sea
foods. Their area being close to the Atlantic Ocean also provided them an
international business advantage. The main grouse of the Niger Deltans is that
their habitat is devastated without remedies. Thus, they cannot engage in any
natural economic venture, their immediate environment — rivers and seas — having
been polluted by incessant oil spills making the waters unfit for human
consumption and poisonous for aquatic life. Consequently, fishes and other
marine animals die off. Oil exploration has equally rendered their farmlands
valueless for cultivation. The people drink diseases from the polluted water,
cannot engage in their natural fishing activities because the fishes have been
decimated and it is difficult for them to escape to other places due to lack of
engine boats and roads.
The criminal neglect of the Niger Delta
was initiated by the mischievous multinational oil companies under the auspices
of the British colonial government. For, prior to 1956 when Shell was forced to
announce crude oil find in Oloibiri it had been drilling and siphoning the
product to the United Kingdom for more than ten years without paying any
royalties, compensation or sales revenue to the indigenes, This could form a
concrete ground of reparation from Britain any day.
It was when foremost nationalists like Dr.
Nnamdi Azikiwe and Anthony Enahoro discovered this vice and raised alarm that
Shell announced the presence of crude oil at that location. By then, crude oil
worth billions of dollars have unaccountably been siphoned to the U. K. — a
devilish impact of colonialism.
Isaac Adaka Boro, an Ijaw and Nigerian
army officer discovered these atrocities on their land in the 1960s and engaged
the federal government in an armed struggle for the control of the Niger Delta.
He was mowed down. In 1992, Ken Saro Wiwa, an Ogoni playwright and social
crusader presented the Ogoni bill of rights to the United Nations alleging
neglect, dehumanisation, oppression and marginalisation by the federal
government and demanding control of their natural resource, crude oil — freedom
from the Nigerian State and the establishment of an Ogoni kingdom under the
umbrella of the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP).
Activities of the group were considerably
peaceful until 1994 when the federal government of Sani Abacha wanted to use
some Ogoni men as agents to destabilise it. The resultant bloody clash claimed
the lives of the "Ogoni Four" (Edward Kobani and co). Ken Saro Wiwa and his nine
colleagues were arrested and tried in a mockery and unjust court presided over
by Justice Ibrahim Auta. The court sentenced Ken and his eight followers to
death by hanging setting but his deputy, Ledum Mittee was set free. The hanging
of the Ogoni Nine in 1995 elicited worldwide condemnation of the Abacha
government and support for the oppressed people of the Niger Delta.
About the same period, Ijaw youths in
their Kaima Declaration demanded control of their resources and freedom of the
Ijaw Kingdom from Nigeria.
At the onset of the Obasanjo
administration, Ijaw youths clashed with security agents in Odi, Bayelsa State.
Some security men were killed prompting him to order the army to raze the whole
town to rubbles. In spite of those protests over the years, the criminal neglect
and oppression of the Niger Delta continued. The current opposition by Asari
Dokubo and his Niger Delta Peoples Volunteer Force (NDPVF), has tremendously
articulated and justified the Ijaw cause with his recent invitation to Aso Rock
by the federal government for dialogue. This dialogue has become imperative
considering what has happened in Rivers State, Nigeria and the world oil market
in the past one month as a result of activities of the NDPVF. There were
sporadic killings in Rivers State due to clashes between Asari Dokubo group and
another armed militant sect led by Tom Ateke. There was also an alleged Rivers
State government complicity in the clashes. The National Council of States gave
President Obasanjo the greenlight to crush any armed struggle in the country
including Dokubo and his group. Subsequent encounter with security agents
prompted Dokubo to declare total war on Nigeria beginning from October 1,
Nigeria’s independence anniversary day. He ordered all oil companies in the
Delta region to vacate their locations.
As a result of this declaration, crude oil
prices soared to $50 per barrel. Shell closed operations on its Santa Barbara
flow station, which produces 28,000 barrels per day. Parent oil companies
overseas became jittery and advised the federal government to invite Asari
Dokubo for a dialogue since he had proved invincible. The item of the September
29 accord most relevant to the Dokubo group is that they will be allowed to
articulate and propagate their aspirations in accordance with the law.
It became necessary for government to
dialogue with Dokubo: his base is the site of the nation’s income garners — the
oil companies which he threatened to blow. He had sophisticated
telecommunication gadgets such that while with Obasanjo at Abuja, he was in
constant link with his group in the creeks. He has made a lot of hard currency
from crude oil bunkering by which he bought modern arms and ammunition as well
as ran his organisation. He commanded local support. Fellow helpless,
marginalised, neglected and pauperised Ijaw inhabitants look upon him for their
liberation.
The invitation, of Asari Dokubo to Abuja
for dialogue with the President consolidates the position of well meaning
Nigerians that the only solution to the Nigerian dilemma is the convocation of a
restructuring Sovereign National Conference of the ethnic entities to discuss
the way forward. Otherwise, who would have thought that a boy described by
Obasanjo as a rascally element could be invited for discussion about peace in
the Niger Delta. In any case Asari Dokubo sticks to his position The Sun,
Oct. 18, 2004 p. 4).
Communal and religious crises, which have
generated various militant groups; signify the discontent among many nationalist
that make up Nigeria. Prominent among these groups are Odua People’s Congress (OPC),
Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), Movement for the
Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOP), the Talibans of
the North East and NDPVF. These groups have one central motive:
self-determination and freedom from central authority. Therefore, if every
nationality in Nigeria — North, South East and West — wants self determination
and freedom, why can’t we sit down in a national conference and settle this so
that we can make progress instead of continuing to patch up the heterogenous
fragile fabric called Nigeria?
If we fail to do this now; we shall be
nurturing the doomsday for this country it is now possible for a nationality to
hold the country to ransom by paralysing government activities. NDPVF has made
it in the Niger Delta. MASSOB achieved it on August 26 by organisaing a
stay-at-home protest for the whole of Eastern Nigeria and on some other parts
where the Igbo inhabit.
The first Igbo man (Aguiyi Ironsi) to
occupy the position of head of state Nigeria did not get any support from
Nigeria, and was subsequently eliminated in July 1966. How then are we sure that
a president of Igbo extraction in this porous and crises-ridden Nigeria will
have the backing of nationalities who are bent on self determination, freedom
and resource control.
Ethnic nationalities in this country have
indicated their willingness for self determination and freedom. Events in the
last few months illustrate this. Now is the time to give them what they want by
convening a Sovereign National Conference where their grievances and differences
will be resolved. Neglecting or postponing it is dangerous.
•Enyeribe, a pharmacist, lives in Numan, Adamawa State.
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