Issues
Leadership Issues In Ogoni’s Dev
There is little doubt that the Ogoni nation is in dire straits since the agitation against environmental degradation and the subsequent clampdown by the Nigerian state. The ensuing genocide precipitated crisis in Ogoniland. Though the crisis left a sordid memory on the psyche of the people of the Niger Delta and Ogoni in particular, the events emanating from it are evident everywhere in the region. For most socio-political observers and leaders of thought, the present underdevelopment, violence, anti-social behaviour and brigandage in Ogoniland is a cocktail of political manipulations, international energy conspiracy and other latent social vices underpinning the crisis that stunted development in Ogoniland.
Before the advent of imperialist adventure by the British, there is no credible history or record that Ogoni people were ever conquered or colonized by any other group. Our first major international protest was to the Henry Willinks Commission of Inquiry into Minority Rights in 1958 and, three decades after Nigeria’s political independence in 1960, Ogoniland had remained the most peaceful and industrialized area in Nigeria. Nigeria’s economy was within this period dependent on Ogoni Division for hosting the first ever gas-fired electricity turbine in Afam commissioned in 1962 while Ogoni and Afam remained in darkness till 2007, the first crude oil refinery plant in Alesa Eleme in 1965, the first fertilizer plant commissioned in Onne in 1981, the first petrochemical plant in Akpajo, the first natural deep sea port in Onne, and over 97 oil wells spread over nine major flow stations of Bomu (Dere), Bodo West, Korokoro, Yorla, Ebubu and four other oil fields operated by Shell and Chevron, both multinational corporations exploiting hydrocarbons in the Niger Delta.
The operations of these corporations created an atmosphere of environmental terrorism, anxiety and fear of an imminent extinction among the natives. The apparent concern of environmental degradation was later confirmed by the UNEP Report on Ogoniland of August 2011. These fears and concerns were lodged with the state authorities and were met with force, leading to the death and displacement of thousands of indigenous Ogonis and a mass exodus. The rest, as you know is now the beginning of what pundits will refer to as failure of leadership in Ogoniland, a culture of divide-and-rule, skullduggery, decimation of Ogoni cultural values, manipulation, brigandage and the impending decadence and violence.
This unfortunate situation in Ogoni is now a subject of critical sociological analyses, academic debates and comments by strategic stakeholders on the possible way forward. This article is an attempt to contribute to that discourse giving an eye witness account of most of the events that took place in the last four decades.
Nigeria is in a deep moral dilemma from north to south and east to west. No zone or region is exempted. Ogoni, as an integral part of the South South zone, shares the same moral and ethical burden as the rest of the country. With decaying family values, lack of respect for the rule of law, no embedded national civic ethic, the debate on the future of our teeming youths in Nigeria and Ogoni in particular should engage the mind of all responsible Nigerians. Interestingly, most deontologists agree that the family, being the basic social institution, has the moral authority to mould the youth from infancy with virtue and love for one another. From the family, the government must lay an institutional framework for an ordered society based on equity, justice and freedom where security of lives and property will be guaranteed. Without good government, anarchy, fear and intimidation will continue to constrain our capacity to freely relate to one another and confront the challenges of developing Ogoniland.
When debates about our stunted development in Ogoniland is placed on a single variable like the government or family, we should realize that both the former and the latter operate within a geographical space and time. It is arguable that even the worst forms of government and governance, the interrelationship, interdependency and networking between individuals, families and society is inevitable to human survival and economic growth. Socialization of our society, basic education, virtue and moral upbringing may impact significantly on the level of development in any civilized society. As we continue to look upon leadership in terms of political office holders, we forget that politics is the mirror of the society.
Political office holders are recruited from family members within the society. A morally deficient society will throw up deficient political leaders and ineffective government. Politicians in Ogoni, as in some other parts of Nigeria, are like comedians who want to soothe the audience through temporal comical relief while the main problem remains unsolved. This is because most Ogoni people don’t care about making sacrifices today for a better future. We prefer the intimidation of our neighbours to boost our ego; living a lavish and fake lifestyle of ostentation, pride, greed and avarice.
I was born in 1961, the year following our independence in oil-rich Dere community in present day Gokana local government, the heartland of Ogoni nation. As a young boy, I witnessed the bombing and destruction of the Bomu (Dere) flow station operated by then Shell BP. I also witnessed the horror of the Nigerian Civil War as my grand parents were terrified and hounded into exile as refugees. Our return home in 1970 was facilitated by the International Red Cross. It was during this period that the General Yakubu Gowon’s policy of Reconciliation, Rehabilitation and Reconstruction (RRR) was implemented. Sadly, some of our leaders at various levels of the society conspired with the policy makers and the bureaucrats to subvert the process and the program failed to achieve the desired result.
The failure of the RRR policy was blamed on the military government, with the insinuation that a civil democratic government will solve all our problems and cure all the societal ills. For me, democracy is a process and not an event. It cures no problem of development. I heard my father complaining to a friend about his frustration to get some of our traditional rulers and leaders of thought to allow the huge compensation paid by Shell BP to be used to provide potable water and educational facilities for the Dere community but they preferred the tons of cash to be shared among some privileged membes of the community. I also witnessed, by the grace of God, most of these chiefs and leaders of thought languish in penury a few years later. This is the stack reality of our predicament to develop or make progress as a people.
Ogoni is in crisis, from the family to the larger society and leadership in all our social and political institutions. The truth, as you know, is often the first casualty in times of war, conflict or other internecine altercations. Those who try to uphold it are often branded as enemies of the people by a few vocal and powerful elites working for their selfish interests. The formation of the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP) in 1988 was to address the apparent lack of focus and commitment by most of our community leaders to see the development of Ogoni in general as a major sacrifice without any option. The first shocker of my life as an elected councillor and vice chairman of the defunct Bori Local Government Council was the wrangling among elites in Ogoni when late Ken Saro-Wiwa was elected to lead our cultural assembly tagged Ogoni Central Union. The angst generated by the emergence of Saro-Wiwa against some of the Ogoni elites forced the change of the nomenclature of the organization to MOSOP, with Dr Garrick Leton as the consensus pioneer president and Saro-Wiwa as the spokesperson.
The anxiety generated by the emergence of leaders of the Ogoni Central Union and MOSOP even strengthened the enemies of the Ogoni people and frustrated our resolve to confront the challenges of development and progress in our homeland. This schism among the Ogoni elites further divided the Ogoni people and no one seems to think of Ogoni as a community of people, but will rather use any opportunity provided by the Ogoni platform for self aggrandizement and personal enrichment.
For Ogoniland to develop, all hands must be on deck. Progress and success must not be viewed from an individual level but should be seen as a collective effort, particularly those elected or appointed and vested with social capital to hold such office or position in trust for the Ogoni people. The people themselves must not encourage those in such position of public trust to accumulate wealth as some of our grand parents did during the 1970 oil blowout largesse that left their offsprings in abject poverty to this day. We must ensure that our children imbibe the right values and educate them beyond the formal classroom level. Our kids must be taught basic problem-solving skills of innovation, entrepreneurship, discipline, diligence and patience. We must inculcate realistic views of livelihood with a clear understanding that the major source of frustration comes from expectation.
As a people, can’t we hold our community leaders and politicians accountable for the mismanagement of the huge oil spill payout in the seventies and other forms of government intervention that were placed under our care? Are we merely complaining and seeking for attention or relevance and acquiesce when we directly benefit from malfeasance? The hubris, greed and prejudice afflicting our people must be checked, our orientation towards life and one another must change; and our concept towards development as gift from outside must also change.
Development, economic and social progress is a deliberate and conscious human activity. It must be well planned and properly executed and sustained. We must realize that wealth is typically the result of savings and inheritance and can’t be acquired or built overnight. We must also see human capital and wealth as a result of sound education, skill and talent. Trust which is essentially a social capital is lacking within our people, and can only be built through unity, strength, sincerity and quality of relationship among the elites in Ogoniland.
Our problem and solution is within us as individuals or groups congregating as a society. Indigenous contractors and service vendors must take responsibility and account for the unexecuted, abandoned and substandard contracts for the provision of some social amenities and critical infrastructure lacking in Ogoniland. Irate and restive youths demanding ransom or tribute before granting access to project sites must stop. Community leaders should be encouraged to demonise, stigmatise and shame any errant, deviant or anti-social behaviour that is not in sync with Ogoni values, culture and virtue. Community leaders must be courageous to question sources of overnight riches by disapproval or acceptance in the communities.
Hon. Mikko wrote in from PH.
Bernard Mikko
This is an open letter to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Chief Nyesom Wike.
Your Excellency,
Sir, ordinarily, I would not be writing an open letter to you, but like a wise man once said, “Silence would be Treason.” So I prefer to stay alive than face the consequences of silence in the face of crime. With each passing day, and as the socio-political tides continue to turn, it has become more pertinent that more people speak up in a concerted MANNER to prevent the death of our party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), as we appear to be, in the words of W. B. Yeats, “turning and turning in the widening gyre” heading for an end where the falcon will no longer hear the falconer
It is unfortunate that since losing control of the Federal Government, with the loss of President Goodluck Jonathan at the poll in 2015, our party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has continued on a downward spiral. It is much more painful, that where it is expected that leaders within the party should rise to the challenge and put an end to this decline of our great party, some have instead taken up roles as its undertaker.
It will be hypocritical to claim aloofness to what I believe is your grouse with the PDP and I am not a hypocrite. It will be uncharitable on my part to discountenance the role you have played in strengthening the PDP from 2015 up until the last Presidential primaries of the party. It is my belief that your grouse against certain members of the party who you perceived worked against the party and abandoned it in 2015 and then came around much later to take control of the party, is justified. Also know that your decision to remain in the Party and stifle its progress on the other hand, as a sort of payback, stands condemned. For a man of your pedigree and stature, it is a dishonorable act, highly dishonorable and stands as testimony against all you claim to stand for.
At least, it can be argued that those who you hold this grudge against, abandoned the party completely and did not sit back while actively working to destroy it from within. But what then can be the argument on your own part, seeing that those you are currently working with against your party are the same people who set in motion, and executed surgically, the plans that not only ended our Party’s leadership at the centre, but ended up dislodging the first Niger Deltan to occupy Aso Rock as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. Is this not akin to “cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face?” That will be worse than folly. Let us not throw away the baby with the bath water because we do not like the soap used in bathing the baby. It will be a grave mistake.
Honourable Minister, sir, it is rather unfortunate that of all people, you have also decided to play the role of an undertaker not only for our party, but for our dear Rivers State.
I will like to take you down memory lane a little. Let me remind you of your emergence as Guber candidate of the PDP in Rivers State, against all fairness and justice in 2014. You will remember that despite the reality being that you as an Ikwerre man was poised to replace a fellow Ikwerre man in Governor Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi in our multiethnic state, Rivers people overwhelmingly stood by you and pushed for your emergence as Executive Governor of Rivers State in 2015. I dare say that your popularity in the entire Niger Delta region was at an all-time high at this point.
I want you to understand why you were loved across board leading to your eventual emergence as Governor of Rivers State in 2015; it was because when it looked like all were against the second term ambitions of the first Niger Delta man to emerge as President of Nigeria, you became not just a pillar but a beacon of resistance by standing for Goodluck Jonathan. Rivers people, as grateful and rewarding as they can be, paid you back by ensuring your electoral victory against the incumbent All Progressives Congress (APC) led by your predecessor. On your emergence, where there were second term Governors in the region, you, a first term Governor, was seen by the people as not just the leader of the PDP, but the leader of the entire Niger Delta region. You earned it, and no one could dispute it.
In 2019, when your re-election bid was being challenged ferociously, Rivers people once again stood solidly behind you. Many were killed in the process of defending your votes. Do you remember Dr. Ferry Gberegbe that was shot and killed while trying to protect your votes in Khana Local Government Area? There are many more unnamed and unrecognised sons and daughters of Rivers State who sacrificed their lives so that you could emerge as a second term Governor of Rivers State.
In 2022/23, Honourable Minister, you oversaw a party primary across board that saw some candidates imprisoned and internal party democracy jettisoned for your wishes, leading to the emergence of flag bearers of our party all singlehandedly picked by you. You have on more than one occasion publicly stated that you paid for all their forms. Even those shortchanged in this process licked their wounds and continued to play their roles as party members to ensure the success of the party at all levels. In what will go down as one of the most keenly contested elections in recent Rivers history, with formidable candidates like Senator Magnus Abe of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Mr Tonye Cole of the All Progressives Congress (APC), and the vibrant youth driven Labour Party (LP), PDP emerged victorious across board except for Phalga Constituency 1 that was lost to the Labour Party. (Not that you did not loose in some other LGA’s but let’s stick to the official figures declared by INEC).
It begs the question, why then do you want to burn down Rivers State, when everyone who now holds political office emerged through a process designed and endorsed by you? Is it that you do not care about Rivers people and you are all about yourself? If so, I am forced to believe that those around you are not telling you the truth. The truth being that in a state where your words were law; where houses and businesses could be demolished or closed down without any recourse to legalities, where Executive Orders could be deployed to stifle the opposition, that your popularity is now at an all-time low. Probably because they are afraid of you, or of losing the benefits they gain from you, they fail to tell you that what you might perceive as a battle against your successor, has slowly but gradually degenerating into a battle against Rivers State and Rivers people. You know, there is a popular saying that, a man can cook for the community and the community will finish the food, but when a community decides to cook for one man, the reverse is the case.
LEAVE FUBARA ALONE
You have gone on and on about being betrayed by Governor Siminalayi Fubara. You point fingers forgetting that some of those same fingers quick to spot betrayals point straight back at you. It is not Governor Fubara that has betrayed the PDP by working against it in the just concluded General Election, and working with the opposition at the State and Federal level to destabilise the party. It is you, Honourable Minister. It is not Governor Fubara that betrayed Rivers people by instigating a political crisis with propensity to escalate ethnic tensions in Rivers State. It is you Honourable Minister. It is not Governor Fubara that has declared himself God over all in Rivers State and has no qualms with burning the state to the ground to prove a point. It is you Honourable Minister. It is you Honourable Minister who told the world that the APC was a cancer and you can never support a cancerous party. It is you Honourable Minister who ended up facilitating the emergence of the same “cancerous” APC that has accelerated the economic decline of this country and further impoverished our people with no remorse. All so you can be a Minister of the Federal Capital Territory? The lack of self awareness is gobsmacking.
Some days back I came across a video where you talked about death and how you do not cry when you hear about the death of some people because you have no idea what might have caused it considering many a politician swear “over dead bodies” and still go back on their words. Those words made me think, and I could see the reason behind them. You see, in chosing to be God in the affairs of Rivers people, you have closed your eyes and ears to reason; you see nothing and hear nothing that can cause you to rethink on the path you have chosen. In your quest to “show Fubara” you have unwittingly united a vast majority of Rivers people behind him, so much that even those who despised him because of you, now like or love him, because of you too. In your scheming, I will advise you not to forget that “the voice of the people is the voice of God”.
Note that the war which you have or are waging against Governor Fubara, has gone beyond being merely political as you might see in your minds eye. It is now one that, fortunately for some and unfortunately for others, has evolved into a war against Rivers people. It is good to point out that no one has taken a stand against Rivers people and won. No one has gone against God and won. In your defiant characteristic manner, it will be unfortunate if you believe your own hubris and that of those around you on the possibility of you being the first to successfully go against Rivers people. It will be a needless gamble; one where if you win you create more enemies for yourself than you can withstand on your political journey, and if you lose, your legacy becomes an inglorious and irredeemable one in Rivers State, the Niger Delta, and Nigeria at large. For your sake as regards posterity, it is my greatest wish that you have a moment of sobriety and a deep reflection and introspection on this path you have chosen.
Honourable Minister, sir, what is left of your legacy is on the brink of being completely desecrated and relegated to the dustbin of our political history, and it will be a sad end to what I will say has been a wonderful political career that many can only dream of. The ball is in your court, and may God Almighty have mercy on us all and forgive us for our shortcomings.
Gabriel Baritulem Pidomson
Dr Pidomson is former Chief of Staff, Government House, Port Harcourt and former member, Rivers State House of Assembly.
In 2015, I made a conscious decision to invest my financial resources, my time, and energy into supporting Nyesom Wike’s gubernatorial campaign. I poured my heart and soul into ensuring Nyesom Wike emerged victorious even at the risk of my personal safety.
Again in 2019, I doubled down on my commitment. I invested a significant amount of money to procure campaign outfits for all twenty-three Local Governments Areas of Rivers State. I spared no expense in supplementing Wike’s election efforts in my own local government, and once again putting myself at great risk to safeguard the fairness and transparency of the electoral process.
However, despite my unwavering loyalty and sacrifices, I found myself abandoned and forgotten by Wike. Throughout his eight-year tenure, he failed to acknowledge my contributions or fulfill his promises and agreements. Even as a former Deputy Governor, Wike denied me my severance benefit.
My investment in Wike’s governorship was not just financial – it was a commitment of passion, dedication, and belief in a better future for Rivers State. Yet, his leadership style of dishonesty, greed, drunkenness and rash abuse of senior citizens brought me nothing but disappointment, misery and losses.
By the grace of God, today I speak not as a victim, but as a hero. I have accepted my losses, and I have moved on. And as I reflect on my experience, I cannot help but urge Wike to do the same and allow peace and development to reign in Rivers State.
Nyesom Wike, when you speak of investing in Governor Sim Fubara’s election, remember those like me who also invested in you. Remember the sacrifices I made, the risks I took, and the promises and agreements you left unfulfilled.
It is time for you, Wike, to let go of the past and allow Governor Sim Fubara the breathing space he needs to lead Rivers State forward. Allow him to focus on the challenges of good governance and the aspirations of the people. Spare him these unwarranted and ill-conceived political manoeuvrings founded on personal agenda and not for general good of Rivers State and her people.
I may have lost my investment on Wike, but I have not lost hope in the future of Rivers State. And together, we will continue to strive for a brighter tomorrow.
Long Live the Governor to Rivers State, Sir Siminialayi Fubara!
Long Live the Good People of Rivers State!!
Long Live the Federal Republic of Nigeria!!!
Engr Ikuru is former Deputy Governor of Rivers State.
Tele Ikuru
