In its historical context, the agitation in the delta is rooted in the seizure of land by Taubman Goldie and the British consul in the 19^th century. Goldie used fraud, intimidation and military force to obtain treaties from the local chieftains in his bid to establish a British monopoly of the palm oil trade.  Leaders such as King Jaja of Opobo and Chief Nana who resisted were defeated and exiled. British colonialism was driven by this sort of commercial expansion which saw Goldie’s United African Company granted a charter of sovereignty over the entire delta area. This was a prototype of the marriage of commercial and political interests that have defined the fortunes of the African nation-state for over a hundred years. In the  subsequent years which saw the various regional mergers that eventually created Nigeria, the ethnic nationalities would rightly maintain that Britain had no right to hand them over to the nascent nation-state having properly no sovereignty over them in the first place. The Sir Henry Willink Commission on Minority Groups acknowledged these fears but rejected independence for the delta communities recommending instead that the Ijaw country be declared “a special area.”  The discovery of oil in Oloibiri changed the destiny of the delta and Nigeria forever. It transformed the country from a mere ex-colony to a high priority enclave; an important trading outpost that had to be preserved for the sake of British interests. This necessitated the engineering of the nascent nation’s political establishment to promote colonialism by other means. This laid the foundations for a political aristocracy to control the Nigerian state in subsequent years.

Crude oil is not simply the mainstay of the Nigerian economy; it is the mainstay of Nigerian politics. The intensity of political competition in the country which often has the accessories of violence and corruption revolves round the pursuit of the presidency which is effectively the position of CEO of Nigeria Inc, a trillion dollar enterprise. The governorship of the 36 states and the chairmanship of the over 700 local government areas are vassal positions that operate in tributary relationship to the powerful central executive. For most of its history Nigeria has been ruled by a patrimonial state which operates a system of patronage sustained by cultic networks of political influence run along parochial lines. The relationship between these cartels and cults is paternalistic with patronage and tribute flowing through various channels to grease the feudalistic machine of internal colonialism. The conflicts between governors and their godfathers reflect the vagaries of this system. In Anambra State and in Oyo State, the governors fought long running battles with their godfathers over control of the state treasuries. These godfathers are no more than robber barons, the local enforcers serving the ruling aristocracy. During the colonial era, the British destroyed the social order of Iboland by creating a new elite class called the warrant chiefs. These chiefs were often recruited from the dregs of the Igbo society, to become enforcers used by the British colonialists to destabilize the democratic culture of the Igbo republican city-states. In the same way, the godfathers of the present dispensation are the modern day warrant chiefs serving the interests of the internal colonialists by subverting the democratic aspirations of their people. Like their precursors, these godfathers are the dregs of the political ferment drawing relevance only from their utility to the ruling aristocracy.

The colonialists never bequeathed a real democracy to the Nigeria nation. Many of the pan-Nigerian democratic movements of the thirties and forties were repressed by the British in their bid to control the political destiny of Nigeria. The colonialists left us with an aristocracy disguised as a democracy. It is clear to the discerning observer that since independence, a feudal psychology has driven the operation of the Nigerian state. The juggernauts imperiously bestriding our political terrain do so with an attitude akin to a “divine right of kings.” Many of the conflicts in the polity arise from a paradigmatic friction between the ethos of democracy and the feudal “born to rule” ideal.

The first principle of feudalism is the ownership and control of land, the most elemental of the factors of production, and thus effectively, the control of wealth. The Land Use Act of 1978, the Petroleum Act (51) of 1969 and the Lands Decree Number 52 of 1991 are only a few of the legal instruments that have been used to disinherit Nigerians. That these laws were enacted by military dictatorships is sufficient ground to question their validity in a democratic dispensation.   This arrangement has been religiously preserved by a coalition of civilian and ex-military politicians, traditional rulers and foreign governments and multinational corporations. This unholy alliance explains the sense of alienation of the Delta communities, where the federal government and the multinationals have exploited the land to the detriment of the locals. It also explains the general disconnection between the government and the people, for the Nigerian state is not a spawn of the Nigerian society but of the 19^th century marriage of commerce and colonialism.

Some apostles and opponents of resource control tend to simplistically reduce the issue to the perceived bottom-line of more money for the south and less for the north. But essentially, resource control is about fiscal federalism and a redistribution of wealth. It isn’t difficult to see why the prospects of wealth redistribution trouble the ruling elite. For decades, their control of land and crude-oil revenues has been an emblem of their ownership of Nigeria which they have come to see as a birthright. In order to reinvent this country, politics must be disconnected from oil. This can only be done by pursuing greater devolution of powers, responsibilities and resources away from the centre to the state and local governments. Concurrently there is a need to revise and repeal those anachronistic legal instruments that have been used to disinherit the people. Giving the people greater control over their land will give them greater control over their social destiny. This will lead to a real diversification of the economy and will also help detonate the reprehensible myth that all there is to Nigeria is southern oil and that the north is poor. Apart from the under-utilized tourism potential and solid mineral riches of the region, the north is the food basket of the nation and has the potential to become an agricultural powerhouse that can service the food security needs of sub-Saharan Africa.

It is instructive to note that Nigeria’s pre-oil per capita income was $3000, today it stands at less than $300. Clearly, development can only be driven by the sort of competitive communalism that existed in the first republic when the federating regions controlled their resources. Resource control is as much about the man in Bauchi benefiting from the gold in his backyard as it is about his Ijaw brother benefiting from the oil well in his compound. Resource control is the key to the economic and political redemption of the Nigeria.  That key is the resolution of a historic social injustice that has disinherited millions of Nigerians and locked them in the dungeons of poverty in the midst of plenty. The curse of oil can be broken and millions of Nigerians economically empowered but it calls for an unprecedented act of national repentance by our political class. Sadly, Nigerian politicians have never shown any inclination towards the sort of redemptive politics required by the Niger-delta crisis. Self-preservation at any cost is the second principle of feudal systems.

This brings us to the future of militancy in the delta. Apart from the bands of criminals now cashing in on the perceived lucrative kidnap industry, there remains a cadre of radicals who understand the truly revolutionary potential of their struggle. Should the political class fail to resolve the festering injustice in the region, then a resort to arms will become necessary, if not inevitable. The oil industry of the delta is both the golden goose and the soft underbelly of Nigeria’s feudal state. The militants may feel justified in mounting strikes on the industry aimed at completely stopping the flow of oil from the region to lend some impetus and urgency to the question of reinventing the Nigerian federation.

There is a biblical parallel to this contemporary drama. Ahab, a despotic king demands Naboth’s vineyard and upon the latter’s refusal to sell off his patrimony, has him killed and his land seized. This sets the stage for the prophet Elijah to pronounce divine wrath and judgment upon Ahab’s house and government. A few years later, a general named Jehu leads a revolt that obliterates Ahab’s government and his lineage thus reshaping the political design of the kingdom. Today, the Nigerian state is playing the role of the feudal despot that has seized an attractive vineyard and slain the owners. The uprising in that region might be the springboard for a Nigerian revolution; a challenge that could submerge our flawed political order and lead to a national renewal and it has been long in coming.

Robot  # 1 | 02.08.2006 16:24

...Read the full article.

ozodiosuji  # 2 | 02.08.2006 18:38

Chris: Your piece is excellent. The language is flawless. However, I detect youthful exuberant idealism in it. If you pay attention to most polities, what you described as taking place in Nigeria, in some form, takes place in them. Consider the USA. A handful of folks and governments own the whole damn real estate. I lived in Alaska and can tell you from first hand knowledge that the Federal Government owns 90% of the land of Alaska. The natives (Athabasca, Aleut, Yupik, Inuit, Klinket, Haida etc) were given 10% of the land as a result of the Alaska Land Settlement Act of 1973. (Alaska was acquired by Russia in 1746; in 1863 Russia sold Alaska to the USA.) If you do the math, you will figure out who benefits most from Alaska’s abundant resources! By the same token, the federal government owns a large chunk of other states lands. (In 1803, President Thomas Jefferson bought what was then called Louisiana territory from Napoleon Bonaparte; that territory encompasses today’s Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, Wisconsin, Minnesota etc. This means that the Federal government owns a large chunk of these states, in some places up to 80% of it. The same goes for most Western states.) The point is that just as the Federal government of Nigeria is benefiting from the oil in the Niger Delta, so is it so in many parts of the world. In so far that I have anything to add to your excellent presentation, it is to suggest an appreciation of political and economic realism. The world is a nasty place. Finally, your contention that the Warrant chiefs invented by Mr. Lugard were selected from the dregs of society is a bit overstated. True, they turned out as corrupt as corrupt can be, nevertheless, they were not selected from the dregs of society. The warrant chief of Owerri, Osuji Njemanze, though eventually corrupt, was initially the pillar of Owerri society. We must not permit our feelings, our understandable anger at the thieves that messed up our republican society to lead us to distort historical facts. Thanks, Ozodi Thomas Osuji.

Fjord  # 3 | 02.08.2006 23:24

Interesting article. That an armed struggle is the end to which the current economic apartheid in the Niger Delta is a view that's as solid as the view that the solution to the Nigerian State will come from the Niger Delta. Unless one is missing something, the per capital GDP appears to be more than 3 times the $300 quoted in the article; not that this does any injury to the argument though, considering that you noted that the $3000 was pre-oil. And, if I may: insightful application of the biblical (hi)story. Now, Osuji: this is one of you better posts, yet you spoil it, first with your reference to that barren state of Alaska (hey, since it's now public record that you lived there, whereabouts Alaska did you live, eh?). That you chose Alaska is indicative of a warped sense of history, or a disingenuity in the application of facts. Let's start, slowly: did the FG of Nigeria pay for any part of Nigeria? Didn't you ignore the history, geography, and demography of the US state you chose? The relationship to the Niger Delta is as oblique as your Alaska reasoning. Yet, thank you for one of your better posts, if any ever came from you. .

ozodiosuji  # 4 | 03.08.2006 01:21

Fjord: Generally, I do not like to engage in childish exchanges but let me point out certain problems with your comments. Alaska is not a barren state. You are, apparently, living in the nineteenth century. When the United States Secretary of State, Seward, bought Alaska, for ten million dollars, from Russia in 1863, the general population of America said that he bought a chunk of ice and believed that the money was wasted; they called the purchase Seward’s folly. For a start, southern Alaska is forested, as forested as the rain forest of the Pacific Northwest. The forested region gradually gives way to the tiara, then to tundra and finally to the sub-arctic region. Alaska, a state that is larger than Nigeria, is rich in resources, including supplying oil. I do not believe that there is any city in the East Coast that is as beautiful as Anchorage, Fairbanks and Juneau, Alaska’s three major cities. What is the point? The point is that you talk without knowing what you are talking about. Chris’ piece is obviously well written but took liberty with statistics. For example, he said that the first Nigeria's republic's income per capita was $3000 compared to today’s $300. Obviously, that figure is wrong. In the 1960s, America’s per capita income was slightly over $5000. In the 1960s, the average Nigerian probably made about $300 dollars a year. If you take school cert holder as base line for reasonable income, Nigeria’s 1960s school cert holders made less than twenty pounds a month; multiply that by twelve months for yearly income and that comes to about two hundred and forty pounds. And the quantity of school certificate holders in Nigeria in the 1960s was minuscule. The point is that his piece is riddled with assertions not born out by facts. Nevertheless, it is interesting reading. Your assessment of my posts is fascinating. Given your apparent inability to ascertain facts before making pronouncements, such as calling one of the richest states in America a barren state, it is obvious that you do not know what you are talking about. As to whether I wrote any of the posts or not, I wonder how you would know the difference since you do not know who I am? Do you already have a preconception as to who I am supposed to be? (I conjecture that you are motivated to denigrate my posts, even my person, so as to avoid thinking about my theses. To think about them is to look deeper inside ones self and see the depressed self view underneath the silly bravado that characterize certain type of persons.) You said something about it now been public record that I lived in Alaska. May I ask whether there was debate as to where I lived or who I am? In public discourse, we need to restrict ourselves to evaluating what folks say and not their persons. I am not slightly interested in knowing who you are, and you should return that favor to me. Let us keep it to intellectual discourse and not degenerate to neurotic voyeuristic interests in folk’s backgrounds. Again, I do not enter into personal debates and regret responding to you. And, this ends it. Ozodi Osuji

Fjord  # 5 | 03.08.2006 03:35

Osuji: I shall return to your comments, but I'm trying to refrain from asking Amadioha, Sango, or Ekwensu to strike the fingers of your left hand for typing that nonsense about childish reference, but I notice I have done so already. So, what was the relevance of your reference to having lived in Alaska? Did it advance your arguments, the facts you presented, and your warped application of same to the Niger Delta? You're obviously one who'll do something you very know you'll regret, but there're many of you. Now, all these pale into nothing compared to the drastic improvement in your posting compared to your pshycho-ramblings. Osuji wrote: What is the point? The point, Osuji of Alaska, is that you probably didn't think of the poulation density of your old Alaskan state, and the relevance of that, including the isolation of Alaska in responding to the "barren" reference. Osuji wrote: When the United States Secretary of State, Seward, bought Alaska, for ten million dollars, from Russia in 1863... Plus, you're not good with numbers, and that's telling. So, if someone paid $7.2million in a transaction, you think you've got the license to say it's $10m? What to do with the balance? Nice example of how to steal money, no? Neither is your recollection of dates any better. Tell: Four years is a full term in Nigerian politics; what does four years mean to you? Apparently nothing. Yet, you praise your egoist and self-serving pshyco-renderings to the heavens. See, I do not attempt to denigrate your person, but will be glad to do that to any of your posts demanding that (you're welcome to denigrate any stupid opinions that I may have the effontery to type on an iNet discussion board; I'll be grateful to you for that!). And, you return to your favourite topic of depression; look, you've got more depression in your pinkie than any hyper-depressed person would ever have in a lifetime. Then you take liberty with statistics; turning the rather gentle reference to the $300 inaccuracy into another pinheaded lecture. But I must end this part by giving you some praise, still; your last two posts are better than any of those rambling offerings you refer to as theses. Congratulations. One important point in this very good piece (at least we're agreed on that) is the thesis on armed struggle in the Niger Delta. I'm not very interested in Alaska (though not so disinterested as to allow trivial facts slide), but in the Niger Delta, yes; that appears to be less than can be said for you though, eh. .

Chinedu  # 6 | 03.08.2006 09:24

Good article. However, the real cogs on the wheel of Nigeria's economic democratisation are those cultures within Nigeria for whom government ownership of Land makes no difference to their way of Life. Those same cultures have no limit to their tolerance of mediocrity and dictatorship - and therefore they have no way of knowing that groups like Massob and Ijaws are actually fighting their cause as well. They prefer quota representation than free competition - and then they turn round and accuse the government of performing poorly. These same groups are somewhat Change-resistant and prefer not to rock the boat of complacency. A point of very major importance is whether most of Nigeria is willing to let go of its Igbophobia in order to destroy Northern political dominance. The choices are clear - it's either equality and free competition for all, or continued northern domination and eventual absorption by islam. The Ijaws cannot face the Nigerian army in an all out conflict, and considering the extent of Nigerian armed presence in the Niger Delta, one has no doubt that the Federal goverment has no reservations about killing every Ijaw man in order to maintain control of the oil fields. I have a sneaking hunch that the Ijaw "fighters" would not want to risk a more open conflagaration of conflict - as their source of STABLE income which is the many oil pipelines crisscrossing the Delta may be compromised in the process. I have no doubt also that the "positions" that are being held by Ijaws fighters are simply areas traversed by oil pipelines. Any genuine attempt to decentralise the control of economy and land ownership/use will be thwarted by ethnic groups who are deluded that their best interests are served by the preservation of their rent-seeking elite. If the Ijaws are at all concerned about the destructive exploitation of their land by forces beyond their immediate control, they have to ally with the Igbos in order to eventually effect a more equitable distribution of political power. Failure to do this will only result in maintenance of status quo.

Son of the Delta  # 7 | 05.08.2006 15:14

Chinedu, It is true that the North used to be a negative political force in Nigeria.However the same cannot be said for the past seven or eight years that a Yoruba(Obasanjo) has been in charge. We are all living witnesses to how he has brutalized the entity called Nigeria. It is not a secret that virtually all the government enterprises that Obasanjo privatized went into the hands of his children or his kinsmen. We all know how two key government owned oil enterprises(Unipetrol & National oil) were given out to Yorubas by Obasanjo in the name of privatization.We cannot have a situation wereby the owners of the oil are sentenced to permanent penury! It would not be accepted.You cannot empower Yorubas,Hausas e.t.c. and then marginalize the Niger Deltans(Ijaws in particular) and expect the free flow of oil. I would not argue with you on the strength of the Nigerian military but one thing I know is that it is a barbaric force.Their barbarism is what has made the Ijaw people to be ready for it since they have nothing to loose whether you fight or not they have made up their mind to destroy all Ijaws so it is more honourable dying while fighting instead to dying while folding ones hands.We are on the defensive they came to our land raped our women.Killed our fathers,killed our brothers,killed our sons,killed our sisters and mothers without provocation.People know the Nigerian Army under Obasanjo commited genocide against the Ijaws and is still planning to do so.Fighters are just defending common villagers.They have treated their prisoners of war in a very humane manner. By God´s grace whether it is open or closed or all out war.Whatever name you call it my people would be victorious.We can´t place our trust in man.It is know man will always fail. Some alien ´Christian brothers´ were the ones who supported the northern muslims for their economic interest when the Nigerian christians were under a difficult situation. In our world today many people only claim their religion only when it is convienient for them.If not how does one explain Obasanjo´s christianity?Why has his relationship with the muslim north gone sour? Why have reforms of his government favoured the Yoruba elite the most?When you talk of Ijaws fighting for the " Ijaw elite".I find it difficult to understand your argument.Are you arguing for the continued oppression of Ijaws by non-Ijaws or what? Why can´t you see that the system is fundamentally flawed and that as long as there is no resource control and equity Nigeria would know no peace.Why should Bayelsa the only homogenous Ijaw state be without electricity when the national government uses Ijaw money to provide it for other states?Why should Bayelsa have only eight L.G.A.s while some states have up to forty or more? What am saying in essence is that as long as the Ijaws or any other ethnic nationality are not in control of their resources then the future of Nigeria would remain bleak. The North was bad,Obasanjo is even worse than the North´s worst.Perhaps an Igbo man if given the chance may be worse than Obasanjo.What we need is decentralisation of the economy.Resoure control as the Niger delta delegates canvassed at the political reform conference.That would eliminate tyrants from our national government.