MOSOP AS A MILITANT GROUP
Recently the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People [MOSOP] issued a press release debunking a classification by the Joint Task Force [JTF] that the apex Ogoni organization is a militant group. By definition of the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary MOSOP is a militant group. According to the sixth edition of the dictionary, page 743 a militant is “using, or willing to use force or strong pressure to achieve your aims, especially to achieve social or political change.” But a militant in the Nigerian context refers to a criminal. The tag militant has a negative connotation. For being vocal or demanding for your right you may be labeled a militant.
The dictionary definition does not quiet fit MOSOP. Yes, the group can be described as a pressure group that is using pressure to gain political advantage and environmental rehabilitation. But MOSOP is not known to be using violence to pursue it set aims and objectives since it started in 1990. MOSOP may be guilty of propaganda or manipulation of the media to pursue its objectives but not of using violence or unconstitutional means to seek for the survival of Ogoni nation.
When it comes to propaganda give it to the Ogonis. The Ogoni as an ethnic group has produced the largest number of Commissioners for Information since the creation of the Old Rivers State till date: the Ken Saro Wiwas, Edward Kobanis, Magnus Abes, among others. Is it a coincidence or there something in the Ogonis that make them to be the preferred ones for this portfolio.
Since the classification of MOSOP as a militant group, I have reviewed my relationship with all my Ogoni friends and acquaintances for fear of being accused of aiding and abetting militant activities in the Niger Delta. Ogoni people happened to be the first set of Rivers people that I have close contact and relationship with and this has gone on for more than a decade. And many Rivers people are wont to classify me as an Ogoni until I will protest that I am an ‘Ete”.
Every Ogoni man is a member of MOSOP, at least those that were born on or before 1993. At the inception of MOSOP every Ogoni indigene contributed, registered or identified with the organization with a token of One Naira. From the educated to the illiterates, the radicals and the conservatives, the bourgeoisies, the clerics, the traditional rulers, men women, children named them. If the JTF classification is accepted then Ogoniland may have the largest number of militants in Nigeria as the more than 300,000 Ogoni indigenes are proud members of MOSOP. They all funded MOSOP. MOSOP was never and is not one of the secret organizations in Ogoniland. The organization has offices, branches and affiliates across the world. They are never known for violence. The violence that engulf Ogoniland in the 90s that lead to the killing of the “Ogoni Four” and later the “Ogoni 8” and the thousands of defenceless Ogonimen and women who lost their during Colonel Paul Okutimu reign of terror was state sponsored to blackmail the leaders of MOSOP to dropped their demands for participation in the management of its petroleum resources and checkmate environmental degradation. Today in Ogoniland whenever MOSOP has a function the families of the Ogoni four and Ogoni eight are at the fore front because they have since realized who killed their fathers and who their real enemies are.
As a journalist working in the Niger Delta, labeling MOSOP and other civil society groups as militant organization rings a bell. Few weeks back, the Rivers State Correspondent of the Guardian Newspapers, Mr. Kelvin Ebiri was invited by the state Police Command over his reports on the January 1,2008 killings, which Ateke Tom claimed he was responsible. Since JTF and other security agencies may not be able to lay hands on the real criminals causing havoc in Niger Delta, they may behave like the chicken in an Akwa Ibom proverb, that leaves its killer and blamed the pot for cooking it. After classifying MOSOP as a militant group, security agencies may soon brand journalists as militants. They may soon seek to know from journalists how the militants came about their emails addresses and cellphones numbers. Reporters, that is what we are, may soon be asked to disclosed how the got their information and contacts.
It may be a ploy to waste the youths and the best of Niger Delta, all that is needed is a spurious security report that so and so person is a militant and was killed during a gun battle with JTF. In short no one is safe. One is not saying that some youths from Ogoni may not involve in the current violence [and criminality] going on in Niger Delta in the name of agitation. MOSOP has been on the forefront of non-voilence agitation in the Niger Delta and to accused its of militancy in the Nigerian sense is unfortunate.
In the words of MOSOP Information Officer, Mr. Bai-ala Kpallap “MOSOP has described as mischievous and unfortunate the reported branding of MOSOP and some other Niger Delta civil society organizations by the Joint Task Force (JTF) as militant groups. The report, apart from being built on faulty intelligence inconsistent with the realities on ground but regrettably exposed a malign ethnic malice; it sadly compromises the role of the JTF. We strongly believe that the declaration was merely intended to create an excuse for a violent clamp down on the organizations and the people”. This report or similar security reports are not just mischievous but an indication that our security agents are at their wit ends concerning the Niger Delta crisis. It reveals the falsehood that have been passed to Abuja as security reports to justify the huge amounts wasted daily in the name of security votes in the various Government Houses in the Niger Delta.
One may ask is MOSOP and the civil society organizations are beneficiaries of the missing weapons from the army armoury that are reportedly in the hands of criminals in the Niger Delta? During the trial of Saro-Wiwa no weapon was tendered except that he incited the youths to kill. This means MOSOP has no armoury.
This writer agreed with the organization view on the classification, “MOSOP would thus advice government to be wary of this spurious report callously authored to create negative impressions and fear in order to attract more funding of its violent operations in the Niger Delta. We call on government to discountenance the report as it is not credible but misleading and capable of sparking more problems than providing answers.”
Labeling MOSOP, alongside other civil society groups in Niger Delta, as a militant group is unfair and a cheap blackmail. We are not all militants, something gave birth to militancy. Let the federal government look at the real cause of militancy, consider the genuine requests, complains and agitation that gave birth to the crisis in the region and the criminals among us would be expose for what they are. From the beginning it was not so. Let not concentrate on cutting the branches but eliminate the problem from the roots.
Like the jujuman from my village would say, if not for juju what would he would have been eating. Some of the security men posted to the region are currently enjoying certain level of comfort and affluence that they would not like the crisis to end. What about the soldiers and mobile policemen posted to oil companies, facilities and installations, some of them for the first time taste better life outside their dingy barracks? They would not like the violence to stop as this might cut short the comfort and dream life. What about the huge security votes expended by the various Niger Delta Governments, what would the benefiaries do if there are no crisis, how will they justify this huge waste? Using Rivers state as and example vehicles, operational equipment and barracks have been provided for all the security agencies in the state , if there was peace they would not have benefited so much because they are federal agencies and government should provide these for them.
So labeling MOSOP and other groups in the region through spurious security reports, after all, may be in a bid to justify the militarization of the area against the peoples’ will and to justify the huge spending of money of security and wasting of human lives.
MOSOP AS A MILITANT GROUP
Recently the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People [MOSOP] issued a press release debunking a classification by the Joint Task Force [JTF] that the apex Ogoni organization is a militant group. By definition of the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary MOSOP is a militant group. According to the sixth edition of the dictionary, page 743 a militant is “using, or willing to use force or strong pressure to achieve your aims, especially to achieve social or political change.” But a militant in the Nigerian context refers to a criminal. The tag militant has a negative connotation. For being vocal or demanding for your right you may be labeled a militant.
The dictionary definition does not quiet fit MOSOP. Yes, the group can be described as a pressure group that is using pressure to gain political advantage and environmental rehabilitation. But MOSOP is not known to be using violence to pursue it set aims and objectives since it started in 1990. MOSOP may be guilty of propaganda or manipulation of the media to pursue its objectives but not of using violence or unconstitutional means to seek for the survival of Ogoni nation.
When it comes to propaganda give it to the Ogonis. The Ogoni as an ethnic group has produced the largest number of Commissioners for Information since the creation of the Old Rivers State till date: the Ken Saro Wiwas, Edward Kobanis, Magnus Abes, among others. Is it a coincidence or there something in the Ogonis that make them to be the preferred ones for this portfolio.
Since the classification of MOSOP as a militant group, I have reviewed my relationship with all my Ogoni friends and acquaintances for fear of being accused of aiding and abetting militant activities in the Niger Delta. Ogoni people happened to be the first set of Rivers people that I have close contact and relationship with and this has gone on for more than a decade. And many Rivers people are wont to classify me as an Ogoni until I will protest that I am an ‘Ete”.
Every Ogoni man is a member of MOSOP, at least those that were born on or before 1993. At the inception of MOSOP every Ogoni indigene contributed, registered or identified with the organization with a token of One Naira. From the educated to the illiterates, the radicals and the conservatives, the bourgeoisies, the clerics, the traditional rulers, men women, children named them. If the JTF classification is accepted then Ogoniland may have the largest number of militants in Nigeria as the more than 300,000 Ogoni indigenes are proud members of MOSOP. They all funded MOSOP. MOSOP was never and is not one of the secret organizations in Ogoniland. The organization has offices, branches and affiliates across the world. They are never known for violence. The violence that engulf Ogoniland in the 90s that lead to the killing of the “Ogoni Four” and later the “Ogoni 8” and the thousands of defenceless Ogonimen and women who lost their during Colonel Paul Okutimu reign of terror was state sponsored to blackmail the leaders of MOSOP to dropped their demands for participation in the management of its petroleum resources and checkmate environmental degradation. Today in Ogoniland whenever MOSOP has a function the families of the Ogoni four and Ogoni eight are at the fore front because they have since realized who killed their fathers and who their real enemies are.
As a journalist working in the Niger Delta, labeling MOSOP and other civil society groups as militant organization rings a bell. Few weeks back, the Rivers State Correspondent of the Guardian Newspapers, Mr. Kelvin Ebiri was invited by the state Police Command over his reports on the January 1,2008 killings, which Ateke Tom claimed he was responsible. Since JTF and other security agencies may not be able to lay hands on the real criminals causing havoc in Niger Delta, they may behave like the chicken in an Akwa Ibom proverb, that leaves its killer and blamed the pot for cooking it. After classifying MOSOP as a militant group, security agencies may soon brand journalists as militants. They may soon seek to know from journalists how the militants came about their emails addresses and cellphones numbers. Reporters, that is what we are, may soon be asked to disclosed how the got their information and contacts.
It may be a ploy to waste the youths and the best of Niger Delta, all that is needed is a spurious security report that so and so person is a militant and was killed during a gun battle with JTF. In short no one is safe. One is not saying that some youths from Ogoni may not involve in the current violence [and criminality] going on in Niger Delta in the name of agitation. MOSOP has been on the forefront of non-voilence agitation in the Niger Delta and to accused its of militancy in the Nigerian sense is unfortunate.
In the words of MOSOP Information Officer, Mr. Bai-ala Kpallap “MOSOP has described as mischievous and unfortunate the reported branding of MOSOP and some other Niger Delta civil society organizations by the Joint Task Force (JTF) as militant groups. The report, apart from being built on faulty intelligence inconsistent with the realities on ground but regrettably exposed a malign ethnic malice; it sadly compromises the role of the JTF. We strongly believe that the declaration was merely intended to create an excuse for a violent clamp down on the organizations and the people”. This report or similar security reports are not just mischievous but an indication that our security agents are at their wit ends concerning the Niger Delta crisis. It reveals the falsehood that have been passed to Abuja as security reports to justify the huge amounts wasted daily in the name of security votes in the various Government Houses in the Niger Delta.
One may ask is MOSOP and the civil society organizations are beneficiaries of the missing weapons from the army armoury that are reportedly in the hands of criminals in the Niger Delta? During the trial of Saro-Wiwa no weapon was tendered except that he incited the youths to kill. This means MOSOP has no armoury.
This writer agreed with the organization view on the classification, “MOSOP would thus advice government to be wary of this spurious report callously authored to create negative impressions and fear in order to attract more funding of its violent operations in the Niger Delta. We call on government to discountenance the report as it is not credible but misleading and capable of sparking more problems than providing answers.”
Labeling MOSOP, alongside other civil society groups in Niger Delta, as a militant group is unfair and a cheap blackmail. We are not all militants, something gave birth to militancy. Let the federal government look at the real cause of militancy, consider the genuine requests, complains and agitation that gave birth to the crisis in the region and the criminals among us would be expose for what they are. From the beginning it was not so. Let not concentrate on cutting the branches but eliminate the problem from the roots.
Like the jujuman from my village would say, if not for juju what would he would have been eating. Some of the security men posted to the region are currently enjoying certain level of comfort and affluence that they would not like the crisis to end. What about the soldiers and mobile policemen posted to oil companies, facilities and installations, some of them for the first time taste better life outside their dingy barracks? They would not like the violence to stop as this might cut short the comfort and dream life. What about the huge security votes expended by the various Niger Delta Governments, what would the benefiaries do if there are no crisis, how will they justify this huge waste? Using Rivers state as and example vehicles, operational equipment and barracks have been provided for all the security agencies in the state , if there was peace they would not have benefited so much because they are federal agencies and government should provide these for them.
So labeling MOSOP and other groups in the region through spurious security reports, after all, may be in a bid to justify the militarization of the area against the peoples’ will and to justify the huge spending of money of security and wasting of human lives.
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