Photos from “Curse of the Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta

The lure of oil is its cheapness. What we mean is that oil is a cheap source of energy. It is cheap partly because oil’s costs of extraction—in the Niger Delta and much of the tropical world—are not reflected in the price at the pump, and what Calvino called the “puny power of paper money,” .

One consequence of the unfettered and wreckless exploration and exploitation of oil in the delta is that the poor people continue to subsidize the costs of crude oil through the losses they suffer in environmental services, quality of life, and extreme environmental degradation. In turn, opportunistic groups— oil bunkerers, gangs, militants—find space to extract (and extort) financial gains from the system.

Rather than getting better, the crisis in the Niger Delta appears to be getting more intractable. Meetings, programs, projects, and commissions multiply—yet the many-headed hydra that is mass poverty in the Delta simply grows more appendages. The path of crude oil development is strewn with skeletons and soaked in human blood across the world.

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Nigeria
Niger Delta
Oil
Shell + Nigeria

Sandy Cioffi, director of the documentary “Sweet Crude” interviewed on Democracy Now!

In this small region of Nigeria known as the “south-south,” something huge is happening. The adverse effects of oil exploration have been unfolding in the Niger Delta for the past 50 years. Now, the people have had enough. From environmental activism to peaceful protest to stakeholder dialogs, nothing has worked. A new brand of militancy has emerged in a different kind of attempt to call attention to the desperate poverty and injustice.

Here, citizens of an oil-rich nation struggle to eat in a land that can no longer support them. The Delta’s water and soil have been fouled by the same oil production that accounts for more than 80 percent of the country’s revenue. Traditional fishing and farming livelihoods are all but gone. Potable drinking water is rare. So is electricity. With pitifully few clinics and schools, curable conditions go untreated and illiteracy is high. Families are broken up, as men die young or take off for the cities to find jobs.

The advent of militancy has brought both hope and fear to the region. People live with the constant threat of war, yet many feel that armed resistance is the only avenue left to make their voices heard……...Continued.

Links: Interactive map of Nigeria / Niger Delta

Slideshow

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Nigeria
Niger Delta
Oil
Shell + Chevron

“The Naked Option: a last resort,” is a feature documentary highlighting the struggle by women of the Niger Delta against the multinational oil companies and military occupation by the Nigerian Federal Government.

The film is still in production but based on the preview and from comments by activists in the ND it should be a powerful film depicting the fightback from the gender commons of the Niger Delta.

Film Preview

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Nigeria
Niger Delta
Niger Delta Women
Shell
Exxon

A Memoir by Edwidge Danticat

Brother, I’m Dying” is above all the story of Danticat’s uncle. As unrest intensified with each regime change, Mira urged Joseph to leave Haiti and the church he had built. It was only in 2004, when gangs including members of his own flock turned on him, that he was forced to flee.

“I wanted to tell my uncle’s story to honor him, to honor my family, but also to share that experience with people,”

`If our country were ever given a chance and allowed to be a country like any other, none of us would live or die here,” he said at Joseph’s funeral…………..Continue Review.

Democracy Now interview

Also check out Raj Patel’s book “Stuffed and Starved” reviewed here and here

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Edwidge Danticat
Haiti
Stuffed and Starved

After waiting 8 years, Chevron oil company is finally being brought to trial in the US over the murder of villagers in the Niger Delta in 1998 and 1999

“found evidence that CNL [Chevron Nigeria Limited] personnel were directly involved in the attacks; CNL transported the GSF [Nigerian government security forces], CNL paid the GSF; and CNL knew that GSF were prone to use excessive force.”
The report alleged that the crime occurred when the Nigerian Military and Police were paid by Chevron to shoot and torture protesters opposed to the company’s activities in the troubled region. Chevron helicopters and boats were used by the security forces, resulting in torture and wrongful death, it further alleged.
The said evidence, the Judge said, will allow a jury to find that Chevron knew the attacks would happen and supported the military’s plan.

This is excellent news for the people of the ND as it also sets a precedent for other cases against multinational oil companies in the region. I hope that the case will not end with the oil companies and that the Nigerian Army will also have to account for their actions and those who took part in these and other acts of violence will be brought to trial. For the full story……..

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Niger Delta;
Chevron
Nigeria