By Amaka Agbu
As Nigeria remembers the execution of intellectual and environmental rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight others 25 years ago, the people of Ogoni where the nine, now referred to as martyrs, hailed from, have presented again some demands to be met by the Federal Government to appease them.
Foremost on the list is the immediate stoppage of the ongoing construction of prison facilities and a cemetery in the area by the the Federal Government.
Speaking during the 25th memorial service of the 9 Ogoni Martyrs on Tuesday at Bori, headquarters of Ogoni land, the Gbeneme of Tai, King Godwin Gininwa, who spoke on behalf of the people, said that the prison was being constructed to lock up the Ogonis opposed to the planned resumption of oil exploration and exploitation in the area by Shell Petroleum Development Company (SHELL) said to be enjoying the backing of the Federal Government.
The Gbenemene alleged: “The Ogoni people have been reliably informed that the prison was meant to lock up Ogoni people and the cemetery to serve as mass grave for opponents of oil drilling in the area.
“We, therefore, call on the Federal Government of Nigeria currently led by President Muhammadu Buhari to stop the construction of a cemetery and a federal prison in Ogoni as we have been informed that the prison is to lock up Ogonis.”
He also said that it was the burning desire of the Ogonis that the government accelerated the clean up of Ogoniland as stipulated in the 2011 report of the United Nations Environment Programme, UNEP.
Also speaking at one of the events to mark the memorial, another member of the organising committe, Mr. Celestine Akpo Bari, a fiery human rights activist, insisted that the federal government must address the Ogoni issues as it did with the historic June 12 issue.
He also condemned the construction of the prison and cemetery saying: “Prison is synonymous with anything that is bad. Ken Saro Wiwa and eight others were murdered in the prison and buried in the cemetery.
So to the government now it is like ‘Port Harcourt is too far, so let us carry this prison and cemetery to them’.
“They must be up to something they are not telling us because when this country returned to democracy in 1999, two issues were at stake, the June 12 and the Ogoni matter. As we all know, the June 12 has been tactically handled.
He has appeased the Yoruba people by immortalising Chief MKO Abiola. So what has happened to the Ogoni people?
Is it that there is no good thing in the world for the Ogoni people to see?”
Mr. Akpo Bari had earlier called on the Federal Government to exonerate Ken Saro Wiwa and the eight others hung in 1995 by the then military government of General Sani Abacha on murder charges and to implement the Ogoni Bill of Rights to enable Ogonis to have full control of their own resources.
He said: “We are asking three basic things: that Ken Saro Wiwa and the eight others be exonerated from the charge of murder they did not commit and for which they were killed.
We are also asking that the government should not even remember or think about oil resumption in Ogoni.
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They should leave our oil under the soil and they should begin to look at the Ogoni Bill of Rights with a view to implementing them.”
At the peak of his nonviolent campaign, Ken Saro Wiwa, a human rights activist and playwright, and 8 other Ogonis were tried by a special military tribunal for charges of masterminding the gruesome murder of some Ogoni chiefs at a pro-government meeting in Giokoo in Gokana Local Government area.
They were executed on November 10, 1995. Others executed along with Ken Saro-Wiwa were Saturday Dobee, Nordu Eawo, Daniel Gbooko, Paul Levera, Felix Nuate, Baribor Bera, Dr. Barinem Kiobel, and John Kpuine.
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