Daily Independent (Lagos)
18 November 2008
interview
LEDUM MITEE, President of the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), was one of those arraigned in the murder case that culminated in the hanging of the Ogoni Nine, including Ken Saro-Wiwa. Unlike others tried, condemned and hanged on November 10, 1995, by the Sani Abacha regime, Mitee was discharged and acquitted.
Today, he leads the struggle Saro-Wiwa left behind, and is a middleman between the Nigerian state and the aggrieved Ogoni people.
In this encounter with SNR. REPORTER, RAFIU AJAKAYE, Mitee opens up on an array of national issues as they affect his people. These include the Niger Delta Technical Committee which he chairs, the formal exit of Shell from Ogoni and attempts to bring another company to exploit the oil, and requirements such a company must meet.
Excerpts:
It's now 13 years since the killing of Ken Saro-Wiwa and others. What has changed between then and now as far as the Ogoni are concerned?
Between then and now Nigeria has realised that it could no longer murder the ideals for which they stood. Because this ideal has blossomed even more than when they were alive. Between then and now, it has opened the door of two options for the country to follow: either to accept the ideals they stood for and do the right thing or continue to pretend that what they stood for can be ignored, and then we go to our peril. That is all I have to say.
What has happened to the struggle they left behind, what has happened to MOSOP Ken left behind and which laid down the workable and laudable strategy of non-violence?
Let me say that for the Ogoni people, we have had no cause to change our strategies. But, I must be honest enough to admit that the responses of the state to our own peaceful methods have unwittingly also attracted or reinforced the sour situations we have today in the Delta. I have had interactions with some of the militants and, even, when I started to preach to them to use the MOSOP option, they said they were surprised I am saying that. They asked me, what was the state's response to our own peaceful method? They said you people tried that and they killed you. So, they said they don't want to go through that process of being pacifist and get killed. So, there are some who have opted or have used it as a justification that non-violence only attracts violent reactions here. The second way is that the government's response has sometimes reinforced the violence option, in two respects:
A, it has done in a way that the more violent you are, the more attention you attract; so that itself reinforces violence.
B, sometimes if there is violence involving 10 people, or maybe five people are killed in a community, government's response is to take on the whole community. So, if you have a community of 5,000 people, because there is militancy involving say 100 people, you wipe out the whole community. Once that happens, you lose the co-operation of the entire community because they will feel you are not after the militants you were after them, and because those people have said they are for their cause, that is why you want to kill all of them. I think the system itself has reinforced violence (more) than they are doing there. That was why I said in my speech at the Martyrs' Day (November 10) that if one of the salutary things that have gladdened my heart was when FG (Federal Government) announced that Shell has to leave Ogoni because, for the first time, you are now saying that non-violence can have positive response from the authorities - which is profound because you now make non-violence look attractive, that it works. But you can encourage more people to follow that route without the price we paid. But, I don't think most of the responses have shown that.
It is significant there is no electricity in Ogoni land - although it is connected to the national grid - neither is there conducive classrooms for the pupils; there is no potable water, according to people. How true are these stories? How have you been coping?
You just needed to see all the things you have seen here, to be able to appreciate our situation. This is my own generator I am firing here. So, if I tell you anything you will feel that someone is trying to pull a spin. From here across my house, less than 200 metres from me, if you cross here, you will get to where every oil from most parts of the Niger Delta are pumped to Bonny, where every child knows that if I turn the valve on the opposite direction there will be no oil flowing in Bonny. We have lived with it for years. And you have not seen people turn it off, else there will be no oil in Bonny. The pipelines cross from here through to the creeks, and it has never been damaged. And, yet, in this village, there are 58 oil wells, and you cannot see things for yourself. And, if you look around, can you see electricity? Do they have water? If you go down there people can show you what looks like a tank; that is a Shell project terminated. They put a tank without pump, and the thing is up there. All they need do is take a picture of it and put it on their website and say this is our water project, but there is no water flowing there. If you go there you will see a health centre. It was built through community efforts in 1974; it has been commissioned by six different governors, our own project, because they don't have any project to commission. So, when any government comes they cover the plaque, repaint it and come to commission it. Shell has done the roofing three times, so the roof is not leaking. But they remove the roof, give the contract to their boys, paint and replace it, and then say this is our community project, but it was built by the community itself. When you see some of those things some of the times you ask yourself: what do you do about these things. Sometimes I ask from the community elders: why do you allow them to remove the roof that is not leaking. The elders would say, listen. You don't understand. Shell has not asked us what we want; what they did was giving us money for contractors; so we take. Any day they want something concrete done, they will ask us what we want. That is why you hear the multinationals say we spent money and is not buying us the favour we expect. So people are not as stupid as you think they pretend to be.
The FG has just ordered the exit of Shell from Ogoni, and we are also aware that it is also trying to bring in another oil company to the community. As leader of the struggle, what are your views?
The Ogoni people have introduced a whole lot of profound changes, not only in Nigeria but in the whole world. We have introduced two things - a concept that must be very clear for Nigeria and the whole world. All over the world, they have gotten it. There are two licences you need to operate: you have the legal licence and the social licence. If you go to Abuja and they give you what they called an oil bloc - I have said it that oil bloc is an insult on the psyche of the people; it is like the Berlin Conference where you share lands. You sit down somewhere and people now share my village out, including my house here and you say you have the oil bloc. You didn't ask me and you just went ahead and shared my father's farm and make millions (of naira) out of that. So, he gets the licence from there. What we in Ogoni have proved is that even the legal licence from Abuja might not necessarily be enough, you need the social licence. You need the social licence in the sense that the Ogoni people will say, yes, you have the legal licence, but we also must give you the licence to operate on our land. Because the Ogoni withdrew the social license from Shell, that is why it has not been able to operate.
But, again, the converse is also true, in some sense. If you have the social licence, if you talk with the Ogoni people and we say ok operate, the Federal Government will say that is illegal bunkering. That is why you have the phenomenon of illegal bunkering; those who secured social licence without legal licence from Abuja. So, the challenge for this country is to get a merger of both the social and the legal. And so, if government thinks that we have pushed out Shell in order to take something like Shell or less than Shell, that is a mistaken perception. You need to talk with us so that we can merge the social licence of the Ogoni people with the legal licence from Abuja.
In the case of Ogoni land, what are those basic requirements a company must bring to be able to operate?
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