|
SOME FOREIGN BUSINESSES SUPPORT REPRESSIVE REGIMES By P.O. BOX 33535, LONDON E9 7YJ
It so often happens that while political leaders and the press in other countries sermonise on democracy and the abuse of human rights in Africa, they remain almost utterly uncritical of the iniquities of international big businesses there. While so many of them give their support to repressive regimes, some of the blood of our conflicts must be on their hands.
Many Africans have persistently accused these business organisations as exploiters of the weak, illiterate and the not-so-understanding ‘natives’, and suck them to the bone. “Most of them are hypocrites. They never talk of their own people who are corrupting our blood-thirsty leaders under cover of business. These people helped Abacha to take all those billions they talk about away; he couldn’t have done it alone. Now without knowing what a blood-thirsty leader Obasanjo was in 1976-9, many abroad are writing hopefully about him.
That’s why many don’t bother with what they write.” Argued Gabriel Seyemiye. Repressive African leaders always take delight in foreign businesses readily co-operating with them. The late Abacha was hand-in-glove with many of them, and used them as much as they used him. They could all act with impunity because an African in one tribe has no sympathy for the misfortunes of a fellow-African belonging to another. Foreign businesses trading here, knowing the evils of tribalism, find in this a situation they are more than willing to take advantage of.
This is particularly acute in Nigeria, with its 200 or more tribes. The country claims to be 120,000,000 in population. The material area of the Niger Delta comprises about eight related ethnic groups, numbering less than 10,000,000. It is from here that the colonial adventurers crept inland and created Nigeria. Like most other African communities, the people are weak, timid and disunited. Petroleum was discovered here in the Niger Delta a few years before independence.
After less than six years of independence the 200 tribes began their bloody conflicts, from which grew the power of the northern military. It was on their behalf that Abacha became head of state, and that Obasanjo was made president in 1999. Like Abacha, Obasanjo is obliged to follow their policy, one of whose central planks is the revenue from the Niger Delta Oil, exploited by Shell. They kill for it. Shell’s greatest and only interest in the country is money. This is quite normal. And they make lots of money from oil from the Niger Delta, particularly, Ogoni where the population is scarcely more than half a million. Abacha saw great financial inducements in Shell’s exploitation of the area, and this explains his reason for killing the nine Ogoni leaders in November 1995. It was to please Shell. But the killing drew the attention of the world, when the repressive situation in the Delta as a whole came to light. Shell’s connection with the killings was widely discussed at the time.
In order to satisfy itself the World Council of Churches, based in Geneva, made a study of the situation and published its report. It was published in December 1996, and the title is Ogoni: The Struggle Continues. On page forty two, under the heading “Shell and the Nigerian military government”, is the following: “Shell would like to re-emphasised that it is in no way associated with violence in the Niger Delta and has placed on record that it rejects the use of violence as means of settling dispute. At the same time, Shell admits to importing arms for the Nigerian military, they allegedly not only directly paid the Nigerian military to conduct operations, but also to provide logistical support to armed units of the Nigerian police and military who shot anti-Shell protesters.
Shell also now admits that it was a mistake to request assistance of the Nigerian mobile police at Umuechem in 1990. Eighty people were kill and 495 houses were either destroyed or badly damaged in the aftermath of the assault. Because the abuses set in motion by Shell’s reliance on military protection in Ogoniland continues, Shell cannot absolve itself of responsibility for the acts of the military. The Nigerian military defence of Shell’s installation has become so intertwined with its repression on the minorities in the oil producing areas that Shell cannot reasonably sever the two”. “Brian Anderson, head of Shell petroleum development company-SPDC – has admitted that there is ‘a black hole of corruption’ in Shell’s operation.” Under the heading “Shell’s influence in the government of Nigeria” the report continues: “Petroleum accounts for 80 per cent of Nigeria’s total revenue and 90 per cent of its foreign exchange earning.
The Royal Dutch Company Shell Group is one of the largest businesses in the world, with interest in over 3,000 companies and operations in over 100 countries. Shell’s subsidiary, the Shell Petroleum Development Company(SPDC), accounts for 14 per cent of Shell’s production and is the company’s biggest producer outside the United States. Shell controls at least 60 per cent of the commercially viable oil-bearing land in Nigeria. And it not just the dominant economic player in Nigeria, but it also heavily invested in Nigerian politics. SPDC executives always become Nigerian bureaucrats, and vice versa.
Chief Rufus Ada George, the former executive governor of Rivers State where Ogoni is situated was an SPDC officer. Ernest Shonekan, a former director of SPDC, who replaced General Babangida(the military head of state that annulled Abiola’s election as president), became president of Nigeria(by being nominated by the military) for a brief period in 1993”. Nigerian who dissociated themselves from their ethnic problems, but are attracted to benefit from foreign companies often become members of the board. With the per capita income as low as something under two hundred pounds per annum, and the average income in public service under eight hundred pounds per annum, Shell and other big companies tend to attract those known as the “less radical elite”. But in a corruption-based economy, more companies are not coming.
What pains most Africans is what they call “double standards” or “ open hypocrisy”, in that while the political leaders and the press in ex-imperial nations hand out lessons in democracy and human rights, they ignore conveniently the evil deeds of business people from their own nations. They know quite well that some European businesses, playing on the repressed disposition of Africans, get themselves too involved in local politics in Africa, and they give active support to repressive and blood-thirsty regimes. All these however pass without comment. So many foreign businesses in Nigeria were friends of notoriously corrupt Abacha and some other leaders too. Unfortunately there are some highly placed Nigerians who do not see the havoc they cause to their very own people, struggling for justice; and they corroborate with evil businessmen. The misery and the burden we carry are of no concern to them.
This suits many foreign company very well. Phillip Asiodu, a former senior civil servant, who is highly respected does not sympathise with the people. Many Nigerians were sad in the 1980s when he said: “Given the small size and population of the oil producing area, it is no cynical to observe that even if resentment of the oil producing states continues, they cannot threaten the stability of the country nor its continued economic development”. There is no doubt that Shell, Abacha and Obasanjo see Asiodu’s statement as very supportive. In 1999 he became president Obasanjo’s economic adviser. In Kalabari they say “money saps good men of their conscience”. The report of the World Council of Churches also states, under the subtitle “ Power and Domination in Nigeria”, the following: “The problem of the Ogoni in terms of lack of development, Shell, environmental devastation and lack of compensation for land is no different than other surrounding communities.
The difference is that the Ogoni has the vision and the nerve to take the issue to the international level and because of that, they disproportionately have suffered the consequences; severe repression, killing, intimidation, detention, rape and military occupation of their land. The situation of the minority group in Nigeria is a form of apartheid. In the Nigerian context, it is the minority group that have the resources, but the majority group that reap all the benefits and have the wealth. To that situation Shell makes a sizeable contribution. Ogoni now stands prominent as the bravest community in Nigeria. Shell, of course, is a very powerful company. It comes from a very powerful country. In regards to international practise in the post-Hitler world, we think that Shell would not have behaved in the evil manner described in the World Council of Churches’ report, if it had been the guest of the people of the Niger Delta.
However, notwithstanding this, Shell could have shown a more friendly disposition to the people of the Delta, from which it earns millions of pound a minute. Its policy seems to be that in a tribally divided Nigeria, cursed with ethnic conflict, to co-operate with the oppressors in the larger tribes is all the better for exploiting us(which even runs to killing and intimidation). But God has been with us. We always remember that even in South Africa, apartheid eventually ended. Shell’s satanic grip on us will similarly collapse. Aliyi Ekineh Patron – Niger Delta Republic Movement(NDRM). TEL: +44(0) 20 89853905 Email: ndrm_niger_delta_republic_movement@hotmail.com
Nov 2002
|