here are many things about the Niger Delta that captivates the imagination. It has a certain aura of mystique that is both fascinating and intriguing. Its mangroves teem with life, and its peoples exude a zest for life that belies the immense challenges that they have to deal with. Tranquil as its mangroves and miasma swamps might seem, rulers who deal with the Niger Delta have since learned that those who take the resilience and the openness of the peoples of the Niger Delta for granted, will most certainly live to regret it.
Nigeria's contemporary leaders must have skipped their history lessons in school, for if they had paid attention, they would have known that the peoples of the Nigerian Delta region are stridently independent, and will, regardless of what the price is, always demand for a fair and equitable treatment. Before messing around with the Niger Delta and its peoples, they should have spoken to the British colonial usurpers who came before them. While the wave of pacification had doused much of the revolutionary fervor across most of Nigeria, Niger Delta monarchs such as Oba Ovonramwen and King Jaja of Opobo were providing not just voice but also action, to their people's quest for self assertion and self determination. Isaac Adaka Boro, Ken Saro Wiwa and others in their mold have carried on with the Niger Delta tradition of principled activism, of selfless devotion to a cause, and of a readiness to sacrifice all - including one's life - in pursuit of the enhancement of the welfare of one's people.
No one will question the fact that a grave injustice has been done to the peoples of the Niger Delta. Oil, that resource that has brought progress to Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Egypt, Bahrain and Venezuela, has brought nothing but pain to the peoples of the Nigerian Delta. Their lands are ravaged, their farms are oil soaked, and the pores of their red earth are locked tight, every crevice and every pore flushed through with oil from spills. Their environment is a blazing inferno of flares. The sulfurous gases that emanate from these flares join with the incessant showers of the Niger Delta to form acid rain. Whatever the oil spills are yet to kill off, the acid rain finishes off.
A SHORT HISTORY OF THE NIGER DELTA STRUGGLE
A few years after Oloibiri started to belch crude from its belly, the peoples of the Niger Delta had already begun to complain about what was being done to their people. Isaac Adaka Boro and his Niger Delta Volunteer Force threw down the gauntlet and tackled a deaf and insensitive Nigerian government head on. For those who do not know, Adaka Boro was a force of nature. A diminutive man whose strength and courage towered high, he was at various times a President of the University of Nigeria (Nsukka) Students union, a policeman, a revolutionary leader, a teacher and a patriot soldier. Adaka Boro died fighting the Civil War on the Federal side of that fratricidal conflict. His grievances against Nigeria were real, but he believed that the future of the Niger Delta was best served within a united Nigeria.
Ken Saro Wiwa was another of the forces of nature that were birthed by the Niger Delta. He could have chosen to look away when his people groaned under the burden of the degradation of their lands. But this author, TV producer, poet, administrator and patriot could not look away. He began a campaign to expose the atrocities in the Niger Delta that placed his tiny Ogoni nation on the world map. Never again would the problems in the Niger Delta be the stuff of rumors. Ken Saro Wiwa, using only his pen as a weapon, ensured that the world became aware of the sufferings of his people, and he fought the oil companies and the Nigerian government to a standstill. To silence his voice, they hung him - by the neck - until he died. But truth can never be silenced. And today, the callous insensitivity of Nigerian governments has forced the young men and women of the Niger Delta into the creeks. A new revolution has begun, and of course, the youths of the Niger Delta have found inspiration in the ancient traditions of resistance exemplified by monarchs like Jaja & Ovonramwen, by social institutions like Egbesu, and by personages like Adaka Boro and Saro Wiwa.
While the current violence in the Niger Delta is deplorable, all well meaning people can agree that the insensitivity of successive Nigerian governments contributed to the crises and to the eventual militant turn that the struggle took. In vindication of the actions of the Niger Delta militants, the Nigerian government is today, more amenable to discussions than it has ever been. Within 4 years of militant struggles, the once neglected Niger Delta has produced an Ijaw Vice President, and a Federal Ministry with two cabinet level ministers dedicated wholly to ensuring the welfare of the Niger Delta and its peoples. The struggle is of course not yet over, and while it is not clear what the future holds, one fact is clear: the Nigerian nation, by electing to silence the warrior who came with a pen, now has to deal with a massive legions of youth that see militant struggle as the only way to bring real voice to their agitations for equity and justice.
Saddened as I am, and as all patriots should be by the violence in the Niger Delta, I am encouraged also by what the militants have not done. They have kept the conflict localized, limiting their actions to the disruption of the oil infrastructure. It is obvious that MEND and the other groups that are active in the Niger Delta can at any time extend the conflict to all of Nigeria. That they have chosen not to do so, thus sparing the rest of the nation, the same carnage that the people of the Niger Delta have had to endure for decades, is a brotherly gesture. For this, we must be thankful.
Something else gladdens me. I have read both the 1990 Ogoni Bill of Rights the Kaiama declaration of 1998. Although these documents were drafted by majority Ogoni and Ijaw groups respectively, most Niger Deltans believe that these documents articulate quite comprehensively the reasons for their struggle, and the goals that they wish to accomplish. Both documents speak as they should, of the travails of the Niger Delta, the inequities of revenue allocation and the environmental and human degradation suffered by the oil producing communities. Yet these documents are crystal clear about the desire to remain within a single united Nigerian nation. It is instructive that not once have any of the groups talked about secession or separation from the Nigerian state. What they want, what all Nigerians want is justice for all of Nigeria's peoples.
ON THE ISSUE OF 25% DERIVATION
The Leedum Mitee led Niger Delta Technical Committee has reportedly recommended an increase in the derivation formula from 13% to 25%. I believe this to be fair. To provide some perspective, the derivation percentages have changed over the years from an absolute value of 100% (1953), to reduced amounts of 50% (1960), 45% (1970), 20% (1975) 2% (1982), 1.5% (1984), and 3% (1992). The current 13% level was first recommended by the 1995 Constitutional Conference and later enshrined in the 1999 constitution.
I believe that there might be need to apply some caution in the introduction of the increase. Revenue sharing in Nigeria is a zero sum game. Any higher fractions of income going to one region occur at the expense of other regions. Oil has not only brought tears to the Niger Delta, it has also crippled Nigerian ingenuity and industry. The groundnut pyramids of Kano, the cotton fields of Kaduna, the cocoa farms of the South west and the oil palm plantations of Cross River have all disappeared because successive governments either instituted policies, or failed to institute policies, which ultimately served to emasculate these sectors and to finally kill them off. Immense mineral resources exist in all regions of Nigeria, but without clear policies emanating from the center, without the enabling policies and without solid infrastructure, all of these resources cannot be exploited. My suggestion is therefore to implement a staggered rise in the derivation target in graduated increases of 3-5% per year, which implies that it would take about 5-8 years for the 25% goal to be reached. This should provide other regions of Nigeria who now rely wholly on oil revenues to rapidly diversify their revenue sources. It should also provide sufficient time for the Nigerian nation to divert significant energies towards developing the necessary infrastructure that will support the emergence of vibrant agricultural and mining activities across the nation. Unless such considerations are taken the victory for higher derivation will be a pyrrhic one, ultimately causing more unrest, more animosities amongst Nigeria's peoples, and ultimately more disunity. I look forward to the day when all of Nigeria's peoples and communities will have total ownership of the resources with which they have been blessed.
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