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About the Episode

The Ogonis are a prominent ethnic group in the Niger Delta. And in the 1950s, the oil wealth found in Ogoniland promised a future of prosperity. It meant that the small agriculture and fishery community could be potentially transformed into an industrial hub. But this dream soon became a nightmare as the government and the oil companies had other plans. The Ogonis never saw the promised prosperity.

Instead, the Ogonis began to live in a dystopian reality with oil spillages and acute damages to properties, land, rivers and swamps that had once been used for farming and fishing. Many Ogonis lost their livelihoods and became dissatisfied with the continued degradation of their environment and their lives.

In January 1993, things came to a head when a peaceful protest by the Ogonis led by Saro-Wiwa’s Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) against Shell was met with violence from the Nigerian government. But what exactly happened? How did the Ogonis’ peaceful protest turn into a nightmare that many in Ogoniland today are still shuddering from? How did the Ogonis’ hopes become weaponized against them?

In this episode, Wale Lawal finds some answers.

Read the Episode 3 transcript.

About the Show

Our second season focuses on the life and legacy of Ken Saro-Wiwa, a writer and one of nine non-violent Ogoni activists the General Sani Abacha military government brutally executed in 1995.

The Ogoni are an ethnic group situated in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. For years, they have suffered pollution and environmental degradation stemming from crude oil extraction on their land. Saro-Wiwa’s protests against oil companies such as Shell, including his leadership of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), frustrated the Abacha government, which relied heavily on oil exports.

Read our introduction to Season 2.

Host

Wale Lawal is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Republic.

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Notes on Episode 1

In researching Episode 3 of The Republic, we made use of the following sources.

Books

Dike, Kenneth O. Trade and Politics in the Niger Delta, 1830-1885. Oxford University Press, 1956.

Hunt, Timothy. The Politics of Bones: Dr. Owens Wiwa And The Struggle For Nigeria’s Oil. McClelland & Stewart, 2005 (originally published 2005).

Saro-Wiwa, Ken. A Month and a Day: A Detention Diary. Penguin Books, 1996. (originally published 1995).

Saro-Wiwa, Ken. Genocide in Nigeria: The Ogoni Tragedy. Saros International Publishers, 2000.(originally published 1992).

Saro-Wiwa Jr, Ken. In the Shadow of a Saint: A Son’s Journey to Understand His Father’s Legacy. Steerforth, 2001 (originally published 2001).

News/Journal Articles

Bird, Frederick. ‘Wealth and Poverty in the Niger Delta: Reflections on the History of Shell’s Operations in Nigeria,’ Research Gate, 2002.

Cayford, Steven.‘The Ogoni Uprising: Oil, Human Rights, and a Democratic Alternative in Nigeria,’ Africa Today, Vol 43, No 2, April – June 1996, p. 184.

Davey, Joseph. ‘Ozurumba Mbanaso or King Jaja of Opobo,’Oxford Research Encyclopedia of African History.  February 25, 2019. Oxford University Press. 

Independent UK. ‘Nigerian Dissident Faces Death Penalty,’ 1995.

Isumonah, V. Adefemi. ‘The Making of the Ogoni Ethnic Group,’ Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, vol. 74, no. 3, 2004, pp. 433–53.

Jaroya, Michael. ‘King Jaja of Opobo, From a Slave to a King,’ Lughayangu, 2021.

Osaghae, Eghosa. ‘The Ogoni Uprising: Oil Politics, Minority Agitation And The Future of The Nigerian State,’ African Affairs, Volume 94, Issue 376, Pages 325–34, July 1995.

Oyinlade, A. Olu and Vincent, M. Jeffery. ‘The Ogoni of Nigeria’. FROM: Endangered Peoples of Africa and the Middle East : Struggles to Survive and Thrive. Edited by Robert K. Hitchcock and Alan J. Osborn (Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 2002).

Suberu, Rotimi T., ‘Federalism and the First Republic of Nigeria, 1960–1966,’ in Toyin Falola, and Matthew M. Heaton (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Nigerian History (2022; online edn, Oxford Academic, 18 Mar. 2022).

Tam-George, Austin. ‘Ken Saro-Wiwa, the Ogoni Struggle and the Aesthetics of Spectacle,’ The Canadian Review of Comparative Literature/Revue Canadienne de Littérature Comparée, Volume 37, Number 3, 2010.

Media

Minority Rights Group. Nigeria.

Nairametrics. History of Oil and Gas in Nigeria.

UN Environment Programme. About Ogoniland.

NDLink. The Niger Delta’s Oil Economy: From Palm to Crude

Episode 3 makes use of archival footage from the following sources:

Faces Of Africa Ken Saro-Wiwa: All For My People. (courtesy CGTN Africa)

1995 Video of Ken Saro Wiwa Accusing Shell and Chevron of Racism in Ogoniland. (courtesy Ogoni TV / Facebook)