Chris McGreal follows a forlorn dirt track to Oloibiri, where oil was first struck in the Niger Delta 40 years ago
ASMALL, rectangular sign on the dirt track into Oloibiri is the sole monument to the crucible of modern Nigeria.
“This is Oloibiri, the goose that lays the golden egg. You are welcome,” it says.
Few of the very few outsiders who venture to the town even see the sign. They usually come by river, winding for hours through narrow creeks and rainforest to the place where oil was first struck in the Niger Delta almost 40 decades ago.
The well that earned Oloibiri its place in history has long since dried up, and the oil industry’s web has spread across the delta. But Oloibiri’s 8 000 residents still cling to promises of roads, sea walls and cash in every
Ogoniland had Ken Saro-Wiwa to play on international disquiet at environmental destruction to campaign for his area. The Shell oil company felt the pressure and scrambled to build roads and schools in Ogoniland. But there have been no such benefits for Oloibiri.
When oil was first struck in Nigeria, Edwin Ofonih was a nine-year-old boy watching his father work as head labourer for a Shell
“When oil was found, we thought we would be millionaires. We are still depressed,” he says.
“Shell was the company that brought civilisation to Nigeria. I don’t see why they can’t bring civilisation to us. The town is very tattered. Shell promised to build schools and to make a sea wall because the town is flooded every year. Nothing was done.”
Shell argued that development was the responsibility of the government to which the oil companies paid huge revenues. The townspeople saw it differently. Oil had been found on their doorstep. Shell was getting rich. Military dictatorships were getting rich. Oloibiri should get something too.
Ofonih does not blame only the oil company. “It was the big guns in Nigeria who spoilt the arrangement between us and Shell. The army and the rich politicians ate that money that Shell was to use for our development. We don’t see a shadow of that money,” he said.
Hope flickered in Oloibiri in 1979 when one of the area’s sons, Chief Melford Okilo, was elected governor of Rivers State. Chief Melford commissioned a road to provide a reliable route to the rest of the country. It was under construction when the military overthrew the
All that is left is a scar through the rain forest. By the time it reaches Oloibiri there is nothing left to show but felled trees and
The chairman of Oloibiri’s council, Claudius Akpalakpa, laments the loss of Chief Okilo: “We cannot do like Ken Saro-Wiwa on our own. Somebody must come up who has the strength to face the federal government. We are too weak.”