Highlight on Ogoni Kingdom as contain in UNPO's record

Date of admittance in UNPO: 19 January 1993.

The Geography:
Ogoniland is situated in an area of about 100,000 km², east of Port Harcourt in Rivers State. 
Because of their agricultural economy and an increasing population, most of the rain forest that once covered the area has been cleared for farming.  The area forms part of the coastal plains, featuring terraces with gentle slopes intersected by deep valleys that carry water intermittently.

Population:
The Ogoni are a distinct people numbering more than 500,000, who have lived in the Niger Delta for more than 500 years.  The Ogoni are an agricultural and fishing society, living in close-knit rural communities in one of the most densely populated areas of Africa.
The true origins of the Ogoni people are not very well-known. One theory is that they migrated into the area from across the Imo River. A second theory is that the Ogoni came in boats from Ghana and settled in the southern part of the area. Believers in this theory point to the name by which most of the Ogoni peoples call themselves (Khana) as a pointer to the Ghana origins of the Ogoni people.

Culture and language:
Ogoniland consists of six kingdoms: Babbe, Eleme, Gokana, Ken-Khana, Nyo-Khana, and Tai. Within Ogoniland four main languages are spoken, which, although related, are mutually unintelligible. Linguistic experts classify the Ogoni languages of Khana, Gokana, and Eleme as a distinct group within the Beneu-Congo branch of African languages or, more particularly, as a branch in the New Beneu-Congo family.
Despite the introduction of Christianity, many aspects of the indigenous Ogoni culture and religion are still evident. The land on which they live and the rivers that surround them are very important to the Ogoni people. They not only provided enough food, they are also believed to be a god and are worshiped as such.
This explains why the Ogoni people have so many difficulties with the degradation of the environment as a result of oil pollution.
The fruit of the land, especially yams, are honoured in festivals. The annual festival of the Ogoni people is held during the period of the yam harvest.
The planting season is not just a period of agricultural activity, but it is a spiritual, religious and social occasion. ‘Tradition’ in Ogoni means in the local tongue (doonu kuneke) the honouring of the land. The Ogoni people believe that the soul of every human being has the ability to leave its human form and enter into that of an animal, taking on the shape of that animal. These characteristics show that nature is very important for the Ogoni people.

Organisations: The Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP) was founded in 1990, to unite all the Ogoni people. First president of MOSOP was the well-known Nigerian writer and poet Ken Saro-Wiwa, untill he was brutally executed by the Federal government on November 10, 1995. The Ogoni Bill of Rights (OBR) outlines the demands of the Ogoni people for environmental, social and economic justice. The OBR opposes the revenue allocation formula under which the federal, state and local governments have almost complete power over the distribution of oil revenues. The Ogoni people feel they were not adequately compensated for the take-over of their land by the oil companies and the environmental damages they suffered. MOSOP became a member of UNPO in January 1993.

Economy: The Ogoni are an agricultural and fishing society.Yam and cassava farming are important ways of making a living, although the revenues of these products are not very high. The most important export product of Nigeria is oil, but the Ogoni people have never profited from these exports. Once the ‘food basket’ for the Niger Delta and beyond, Ogoniland’s agricultural production has now been severely reduced. This is partly due to loss of farmlands through oil polution and partly to soil fertility problems arising from acid/alkaline rain caused by gas flaring. Large areas of fresh and salt water resources as fishing grounds have also been rendered useless by oil spills. Food is becoming increasingly expensive and potential farmers are too poor to pay for seeds and labour. Poverty has worsened in the Ogoni areas during the last years. Nearly all oil workers are people coming from outside the area whom the local people have had to compete with for basic commodities. Besides the oil installations and refineries there are no manufacturing industries in Ogoni to reduce unemployment. This situation increasingly results in psycho-social degradation.

There are no government projects to address the problems of development in Ogoni-land. Health facilities are almost non-existent and school buildings are collapsing with the classrooms and laboratories empty. Attracting foreign aid to Ogoni-land has been difficult and a couple of community self-help initiatives by the people were branded ‘MOSOP-inspired’ and stopped.

Ogoni-land is in total economic isolation by the government and most roads have been left to wear, making transportation extremely difficult.

Environmental problems: The environmental costs of the oil exploiration have been and still are, very high. The agricultural and fishing communities experienced huge oil spills and pollution of drinking water, fishing grounds and farmlands. Large flares burnt gas from the oil extraction process, illuminating the sky day and night and polluting the air. The 1970’s brought increasing activity from the oil companies, claiming more space in an already crowded territory, and resulting in a deteriorating environment and in decreasing crop yields and fish catches.

History: Archaeological and linguistic evidence suggests the Ogoni have inhabited the Niger Delta for up to 500 years. They established an organized social system which worked under a monarchy and under which men and women of courage and ability enjoyed a special status. During the slave trade, Ogoniland lay on the slave route from the hinterland to the coastal slave markets. However, no Ogoni man or woman was taken as a slave. Marriage with a neighbour, except the Ibibio, was forbidden by Ogoni customs and tradition. This way, the Ogoni people were able to live in relative isolation during the era of the slave trade. When other forms of trade were introduced into the region in the second half of the 19th century, weapons were purchased and wars became the order of the day. After the Berlin Treaty of 1885, Nigeria came under British colonial rule, but it was not until 1901 that British forces arrived in Ogoniland. The cultural diffences led to resistance on the side of the Ogoni people, but as they were not strong enough to resist the British patrols the Ogoni people were finally subjugated in 1914. The British saw Nigeria in terms of three major ethnic groups: the Hausa-Fulani, the Yoruba and the Igbo, thereby ignoring more then 250 smaller peoples, including the Ogoni. The Ogoni were regarded with contempt by all other groups in the Delta region and were often positioned at the bottom of the social ladder.

History of the conflict: In 1958 Shell Oil Company struck oil in Ogoniland, which set in motion a process that dramatically affected not only Ogoni society, but Nigeria as a whole. Today, oil accounts for over 90% of Nigeria’s export earnings and some 80% of government revenue, controlling the entire Nigerian economy. The land of the Niger Delta is the source of over 90% of Nigeria’s oil. For the Ogoni, who live in this region, the environmental and social costs of oil exploitation were painfully high. In 1990, the Ogoni organized themselves in the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP). The President of MOSOP was the well-known Nigerian writer and poet Ken Saro-Wiwa. The Ogoni Bill of Rights (OBR) outlined their demands for environmental, social and economic justice. The OBR opposed the revenue allocation formula under which the federal, state and local governments have almost complete power over the distribution of oil revenues. The Ogoni felt they were not adequately compensated for the take-over of their land by the oil companies and the environmental damages they suffered.

In 1993, Shell withdrew from Ogoniland, because of the hostile attitude of the local community to the company’s activities. Later that year Shell went back under the protection of the Nigerian military. The peaceful protests of the Ogoni against the building of yet another pipiline were answered with gunfire. Several conflicts occurred between July 1993 and April 1994 between Ogoni and their neighbours. Available evidence, including the sophisticated weaponry that was used by the adversaries of the Ogoni, indicate that governmental authorities were probably behind these supposedly "ethnic conflicts". Following the second such conflict, in April 1994, a huge military operation was launched by the government, supposedly to restore order, but in fact destroying Ogoni lives and property.

On May 21, 1994, four conservative Ogoni leaders were murdered in Gokana Kingdom, reportedly by angry youths. Ken Saro-Wiwa, Ledum Mitee and a number of other MOSOP leaders were arrested and accused of involvement in the murders. The day after the murders, the Internal Security Task Force, a military unit set up especially to "restore order" in Ogoniland, under command of Lt. Col Okuntimo, stormed into Ogoniland raiding, burning and looting villages. While thousands of Ogoni villagers took refuge in the bush, hundreds were detained and tortured. Many Ogoni died in the weeks that followed.

In February 1995, after eight months of being detained without official charges, Ken Saro-Wiwa and the other Ogoni leaders were brought before a special tribunal, established by the military government. While in detention, the accused were often denied access to lawyers, medical care and family members. Independent international observers expressed their deep doubts about the fairness of the trial in protest of the Tribunal’s failure to meet Nigeria’s own standards of fairness.

On October 31, 1995, Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other Ogonis were sentenced to death by the Special Tribunal. In blatant defiance of numerous appeals by the international community, Ken Saro-Wiwa and his eight fellow Ogoni were brutally executed on Friday, November 10, 1995. Ken Saro-Wiwa had been a prominent figure within UNPO.

In March 1996, non-partisan elections were held in Nigeria to fill all local government seats with elected civilian Chairs and Councillors. It was widely reported that all persons associated with MOSOP were prevented from participation, and those who presented themselves were either beaten or detained and later disqualified. Since the election of Obasanjo, the situation of the Ogoni people has somewhat improved. The Obasanjo government seems to be more committed towards the principles of democracy, human rights and good governance. At the moment government sponsored development projects and projects initiated by Shell are organized in Ogoniland.

In the first months of 2001, MOSOP participated at the Oputa Human Rights Investigation Panel hearings in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. MOSOP called on the Nigerian military to accept responsibility for grave human rights violations by its officer corps against the Ogoni, committed between 1994 and 1998. Senior officers appearing for the Oputa Panel played down and even denied any involvement in the arbitrary shootings, rapes, assaults and detentions. These testimonies, thus, seem to be nothing less than a disgrace to the whole purpose of the Panel; to bring justice to the victims of these human rights violations. Another important development was the US Supreme Court ruling that Shell International and its subsidiary Shell Transport and Trading can be prosecuted for their alleged involvement in the Ken Saro-Wiwa murder case.

Although Shell International stopped its activities in Ogoniland, the degradation of the environment still continues. Abandoned pipelines cause major troubles. Due to leakages the oil runs freely and destroys the Ogoni lands.

© July, 2007  MOSOP- Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People,  All rights reserved.