The Other Abacha From Etueke

When President Jonathan was elected (?) the President of Nigeria the Ogoni people gushed about his presidency. They thought that he was their human messiah that was coming to walk on water, turn their water into wine and make old things new again. President Jonathan became the President of Nigeria on the wave of the struggle of the Ogoni people. The expectations were high given that Jonathan was from the Niger Delta and has a firsthand knowledge of the plight of the Ogoni People and more so the Niger Delta. Then came along Abacha: Jonathan disappointed the Ogoni People and the entire Niger Delta. The punchline is that President Jonathan betrayed the Ogoni people and the people of the Niger Delta.

The UNEP reports came out and the President was saddled with the responsibility of implementing it and his inaction kept that from happening. This is the report that the President should have used as the model for the cleaning up of the entire Niger Delta, but that did not happen. The Ledum Mittee's committee report is another failure on the part of President Jonathan. He launched the committee and promised prompt action but chickened-out when he was needed most. As Ogoni goes, so goes the Niger Delta. Oil exploration has taken a toll on the environment of the entire Niger Delta.

Oil and gas exploration had brought some startling changes to the ecosystem. Some mammals and sea foods native to the Niger Delta had disappeared. The Ogoni people are drinking water laced with higher level of benzene. Rain is toxic due to gas flaring and life expectancy is minimal, far more than people realize due to sickness from carbon monoxides poisoning.

During the 2014, constitutional conference, the president reckoned it apt not to invite the Ogoni people even when the Ogoni question is an equation in this project called Nigeria. The Ogoni bill of rights and the devastated environment can't be wished away. It took the Ogoni people pain to be called into the conference at a whim. Again the President promoted Alhaji Ibrahim Auta, the trigger man behind the death of Ken Saro Wiwa, It's recalled that Ahaji Ibrahim Auta was the chairman of the Kangaroo military tribunal that was set up by the then head of State Sani Abacha, to frame and murder Ken Saro Wiwa. He is now the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court. When President Jonathan wanted to confer honors on some prominent Nigerians, Abacha was not left out which made our venerable Wole Soyinka to say this, “We are speaking of a man who placed this nation under siege during an unrelenting reign of terror that is barely different from the current rampage of Boko Haram. It is this very psychopath that was recently canonized by the government of Good luck Jonathan in commemoration of one hundred years of Nigerian trauma.” So, now when the Ogoni people take a look at President Jonathan all they see is another Sani Abacha from Etueke and can't trust him even with their dead plants.

As though the Ogoni people have not suffered enough, the wife of the President have exacerbate a once fragile relationship between her Okrika People and their Ogoni neighbors: the first lady of Nigeria came to some Ogoni villages and asked them to give up some piece of their real estate for some companies to establish in exchange for employments. Tricked, they signed suspicious documents just to find her Okrika people building permanent residences on Ogoni land. This is a potential communal crisis that will go bang once the first family moves back to Etueke.

I had thought that Abacha and Ibrahim Babangida were the most corrupt people in the annals of this country called Nigeria until there was another Abacha from Etueke. The only president whose minister of Petroleum spent ten billion naira as travel expenses in two years without rebuke from the president: and also immuned from prosecution. My stomach churned whenever she was called to answer to her frivolous behavior and the court would not invite her.

President Jonathan is that uncle that squandered the inheritance of the Niger Delta and Nigeria at large. Bayelsa, which is the home of the President, is the same way he left it before he became President: there is no water, no electricity, and no job and there are no good schools. The President spent all his energy in fighting his perceived political enemy, the Governor of Rivers States. While I am not a fan of Governor Ameachi, I feel that the President was out of his ambit to making sure that the Governor was dejected.

President Obasanjo knew that President Umaru Yaradua would not survive the rigors of office and then positioned President Jonathan for that moment to arrive. President Obasanjo knew that the only way he could have assuage the people from the Niger Delta was to have someone from the region do the job and that person turned out to be the current president Jonathan. This is a theory that I will stick with until someone else disproves me. Nigeria's politics is always theatrical-full of drama and intrigues.

The Niger Delta is the home is Daka Boro, Ken Saro Wiwa and Ms Ankio Briggs and other men of ideas. President Jonathan and his murky performance is not a true reflection of the Niger Delta.

It's recalled that oil was first struck in the Niger Delta well before 1958, as popularly claimed. Oloibiri was the first to play host to oil exploration in Nigeria and today Oloibiri sits as a sad reminder of what oil exploration is to the People of the Niger Delta. Now you would think that the President would muster the spine to revoke all the oil blocs' licenses from the Northern Oligarchy. The only Northern person who would merit an oil bloc from the south is Aliko Dangote, just because he has proven that he can put his fortunes to good use. Others have them and have not used them to alleviate the lives of the people around them. As Jonathan comes home to Etueke I only hope that the Ogoni people and the entire Niger Delta would find it in their hearts to forgive him.

Toate Ganago is a Pastor and can be reached at [email protected]

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Articles by Toate Ganago