20 CSOs, Rights Groups Oppose Oil Production Resumption In Ogoniland

Twenty civil society organisations (CSOs) and rights groups have opposed the planned resumption of oil production in Ogoniland, Rivers State, warning against reopening oil wells in the Niger Delta until outstanding environmental and justice concerns are addressed.

The groups, which made their position known while addressing journalists in Port Harcourt, also rejected plans to open new oil wells across the Niger Delta, insisting that oil production should not resume in Ogoniland under the present conditions.

Speaking on behalf of the organisations, Executive Director of Miiderkor Environmental Development Initiative (MEDI), Celestine Akpobari, said the process of resuming oil exploration and production in Ogoniland was moving faster than the truth, the environmental cleanup and the consent of affected communities.

The declaration comes as the country marks the anniversary of the execution of environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other Ogoni leaders on November 10, 1995.

Akpobari said their execution was not an isolated tragedy but the culmination of a two-year military campaign of repression against the Ogoni people.

“We, the undersigned civil society organisations, environmental justice groups, community-based organisations and allies, stand today in solidarity with the people of Ogoniland to say clearly and without apology: there must be no resumption of oil production in Ogoniland under the present conditions, neither should any new oil well be opened in the Niger Delta,” he said.

He stressed that the opposition was not against dialogue or development but against a process that failed to address the concerns of communities whose land, water and livelihoods had been affected by oil exploration.

The groups also recalled previous military operations against communities in the Niger Delta, citing the November 1999 military invasion of Odi in Bayelsa State following the killing of police officers.

According to Akpobari, the operation ordered by the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo resulted in widespread destruction, with independent estimates placing the civilian death toll between several hundred and 2,500.

He said almost every building in Odi, except a bank, a church and a health centre, was destroyed.

The groups also cited the 1990 Umuechem killings, alleging that the community’s traditional ruler, his children and residents involved in peaceful protests were murdered and thrown into a river.

They argued that the experiences reflected a recurring pattern of repression against Niger Delta communities demanding environmental justice and accountability from oil companies and government authorities.

Akpobari further said the injustices surrounding Saro-Wiwa’s execution remained unresolved, pointing to the continued detention of the Ken Saro-Wiwa Living Memorial, a sculpted bus created by artist Sokari Douglas Camp and donated to the Ogoni people.

He said the Nigeria Customs Service had held the memorial in Lagos since September 2015 despite a directive from the National Assembly and a 2023 Federal High Court ruling ordering its release.

The groups also criticised the presidential pardon granted to Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni Eight, arguing that it treated them as convicted criminals rather than victims of what they described as a stage-managed military tribunal.

“What the Ogoni people and the wider justice movement have demanded is not clemency but full exoneration and a formal admission that the trial was a miscarriage of justice,” Akpobari said.

He maintained that treating the executed activists as convicts who required presidential mercy amounted to a continuing injury to their memory and the communities seeking justice.

The organisations recalled that oil production in Ogoniland stopped in 1993 following sustained protests by the Ogoni people, whose demands were outlined in the 1990 Ogoni Bill of Rights.

They said the demands included the right of communities to benefit from the natural resources on their land and the accountability of those responsible for environmental destruction.

Akpobari said the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), in its 2011 Environmental Assessment of Ogoniland, had documented extensive environmental pollution, including contaminated soil, polluted creeks and drinking water, and prolonged exposure of communities to hydrocarbons.

The groups insisted that the findings and unresolved environmental challenges must be addressed before any decision to resume oil production in the area.