(The following story is from the Riverfront Times)

<pre>
BY CHRIS KING

We are privileged to have in our community a courageous group of
political exiles from what is arguably the most massive and motivated
indigenous rights and environmental justice struggle on the face of the
earth: the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP).
        MOSOP was formed in 1990 by the late Ken Saro-Wiwa, a gifted
writer and committed community organizer from Ogoni (the people and the
land share the same name, reflecting lexically the essential importance
of the environment to the people). The Ogoni are one of the indigenous
language groups from the Niger Delta in Rivers State, Nigeria, the
source of nearly all of that nation's oil -- nearly all of which is
consumed here in the U.S. Oil has been the principle economic support to
independent Nigeria, which is presently ruled by a military junta which
came to power after the annulment of the fair and free presidential
election of Bashorun Moshood Abiola. General Sani Abacha, who took power
from an interim government after serving as "hatchet man" for the
previous dictator, I.B. Babangida, has earned the title "chief
abortionist" of democracy from Nigerian Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka.
After he executed Saro-Wiwa and eight other core MOSOP activists last
November on trumped-up charges without fair trial, Abacha also earned
the international reputation of murderer and enemy of freedom.
        The history of MOSOP, its ideals and methods, its grievances
against the Nigerian military government and Shell Oil, the principle
despoiler of Ogoni, will be told below in the words of the seven
activists who live here now, thanks to the United Nations High
Commission on Refugees and the International Institute. They are
strangers in a strange land, hounded from their home country for the
crime of giving hope to hopeless, exploited people. They loved their
home and people enough to struggle to free them, using their rare
privileges of education and position -- they were politicians,
businessmen, writers and civil servants -- not to make money, but to
recreate collective consciousness. They were successful enough to
threaten the profits and image of a major international corporation and
the military regime it supports, and were fortunate to escape with their
lives. Some 3,000 Ogoni have not been as fortunate.
        Here in our town they look for work and aim to regroup their
movement. Back home they moved from village to village, educating,
convening rallies attended by hundreds of thousands of people, some of
whom would pick up automobiles and dance with them on their shoulders.
Now they test the strange waters of the internet and form their first
local coalitions with activists from the American Friends Service
Committee, the Rainforest Action Network, the Coalition for the
Environment and the Sierra Club, whose call for an international boycott
of Shell has been joined by the fledgling MOSOP-Missouri, which will
direct an informational picket at a different local Shell station on the
10th of each month (Saro-Wiwa was executed last November 10th).
        They also hope to revive what Soyinka calls "the comatose nature
of global conscience" and inspire the international community to
sanction Nigeria and boycott Shell. As for their new home country, the
U.S. Congress has two bills before it, one in the House and one in the
Senate, concerning Nigerian democracy. Both fall far short of proposing
serious economic imperatives like an oil embargo; neither have seen
committee action. MOSOP activists in the U.S. -- there are some 25
including our new St. Lousians -- also face the unlikely enemy of the
black press, which Abacha has successfully courted, and some
African-American legislators like Carol Moseley-Braun, who has scorned
the use of "crass political muscle" against the Abacha regime. Perhaps
these individuals should read Ken Saro-Wiwa, who has much to teach us,
even from the grave. "If the Americans did not purchase Nigeria oil," he
wrote, "the Nigerian nation would not be, nor would the oppressive
ethnic majority in the country have the wherewithal to pursue its
genocidal intentions."

Noble Obani-Nwibari

        My grandfather lived to be 115 years old. He lived in a thatched
hut with no good medicine, but he could go to the streams and get fish,
go to the bush and get animals and the soil was fertile for his crops.
Now there has been oil spillage and everything is dead. The sea is
polluted, the land is polluted, the forest has been destroyed, bulldozed
to get at oil. They have bulldozed people's farms. In America, even in
the city, you see little animals jump. Not in my place. Shell drove them
away. I saw African wild life for the first time in a zoo in St. Louis.
        Back home I was a very big business man, a manager for a major
company. I also held high political positions. I became Vice-President
of MOSOP after I became secretary to the local government council. Ken
was the President. We did everything together, we planned, ate, slept,
moved togeher, everything under the sun, everything, everything,
everything! MOSOP was not a job, it  was an idea, a vision for the
people. When I began the MOSOP work, traveling, organizing, in
conference all the time, my business deteriorated. If you have a
business, you must be there for it to function smoothly. But if you are
an an activist and you know there is a rally with 10,000 people, even if
lions stood in your path you would cross over to get to them. Because if
you don't get to the people, they will be disappointed. And to
disappoint people is very dangerous.
        I should have come to America as a businessman, not as a
refugee. I was making it, I tell you. Money wasn't my problem. I had
three cars, a nice home in the city, seven acres at my country home.
People came to me for money, for help educating their children.  I
always helped people, so my name carried far. Money humbles a humble
person. If by the grace of God you get some money, use it for human
development. Planes, big buildings, all of this is nice, but what of the
people behind you? They are agonizing. I am not here in America for the
money. I keep thinking of the people back home. Some are not eating,
some are in prison. My mind is always on that place. It never rests. In
my mind I cannot erase the Ogoni people.
        Sometimes when I talk, tears gush out the eyes of my heart. I
have been arrested six times and beaten each time. In April of 1994 I
was beaten and badly tortured and nearly killed. On May 21, 1994, four
Ogoni leaders who had been bought off died in a mob action. The
government arrested Ken and 27 others and declared other core activists,
including me, wanted. I went into hiding, from one bush to the other,
and only came out at night. The mosquitoes! The pains! I disguised
myself with beards. When I had to walk in public I would stagger like a
drunk. My mother died while I was in hiding and three of my close uncles
but I could not go see any of them put to rest.
        My father always told me, "Tell the truth and stand by it." I
grew up hating anything that went against the masses of people. If that
blood is not in you, you can see injustice and close your eyes. I did
not know telling the truth would bring such persecution. You people here
are so blessed with your freedom. But if you see people suffering and
you don't get up and fight, God can take your blessings away.
        I have never fought a losing fight. I am full of boldness and
courage. And the more calculated I am, in the fullness of time I will
find the people I need. We are not asking for money. Money does nothing.
We are asking for human being, human being does something. You can have
all the money but no ideas and then you may as well not have a dime.

Florence Obani-Nwibari

        When MOSOP formed there needed to be an affiliated body for
women. It was in this body that I found myself, The Federation of Ogoni
Women's Associations. I was the assistant secretary of FOWA in the Tai
Kingdom, where I am from. We would organize women for the struggle. We
used to go to so many places and educate other women about what the
struggle was doing. We would teach that Shell occupies our land and has
cheated us for a long time. They have not done environmental impact
studies, they did not bury their pipes. This is what Shell has done to
us that aught not to be so:  They take our resources yet we can't go to
school, our farms are no good, we have no roads, no hospitals, no
pipe-borne water, no electricity, the streams are foul through the
spillage of oil.
        The people all had that mind -- yes, the land is polluted; yes,
we have been cheated. Ogoni women were finding that their produce does
not come up because of the oil problem. This is terrible for us because
out of our crops we sell some to make money to pay for our childrens'
education. Now people don't have enough so the children are suffering.
So people supported the struggle. The majority turned up.
        Then, as the story goes, in 1994 we had that problem in Gokana
kingdom when four prominent people died in the presence of the military.
Instead of investigating what happened, the government placed the whole
of the blame on MOSOP. They arrested the leaders and declared the other
core activists wanted. My husband happened to be on that list. Since
then -- 21 May, 1994 -- my husband has been in hiding. That time was
horrible. Apart from me, nobody knew where he was. I could not go to the
place during the day, they would trace my movements. I could only go at
night. I was arrested four times, and each time released on the grounds
that I go and get my husband.
         After Ken and the others were killed, they intensified their
search for the wanted men and there was nothing we could do but escape
the country. Since we have been resettled here, I have had peace of
mind. Nobody is coming to arrest my husband. Nobody is trying to trace
us. I find the American accent difficult and jobs are a problem, we have
not found any yet, though I know we also will get some and then life
will be good for us here. Though our happiness does not last when we
think about home.

Bomadum Abueh

        Shell has been in Ogoni since 1958, so this started before I was
even born in 1959. I was born into Shell's problems and I saw them
growing up. They were interested in making money, not developing the
people or the land there. As oil flows through the pipes, you cannot
sleep in the houses nearby. To go to our streams and farms you must walk
over these pipes. If they burst when you are sleeping it flows into your
house, and it is hot. The gas flaring gives off terrible heat, and Shell
has actually said that through these flares they provide us with light!
One time I protested to a Shell man and he said, "Where do you think you
are? Remove the 'S' from 'Shell.' You are in hell."
        I grew up and finished high school and worked for ten years plus
in the Nigerian Ports Authority. When MOSOP came up I felt I had to go
home and help people understand the atrocities Shell has committed. So I
left my job and went into the restaurant business in Rivers State
capital, Port Harcourt, then left there for the local government
headquarters so I could be mostly at home helping mobilize the people. I
helped spread what MOSOP was all about. We were split into different
groups -- traditional rulers, teachers, businessmen, students, women. I
would attend these different meetings, move from village to village.
Then I contested for the Federal House of Representatives on the
platform of the Social Democratic Party as the candidate for my local
government, but the election was rigged; we were still collating the
results when they announced the results! They were well aware what I had
in mind.
        One night I was in my restaurant in Bori, the local government
capital. At 3 a.m. there was a knock and military men took me to the
police station. I spoke to the officer in charge and gave them money.
That was all, that saved my life. I was released that day. The second
time Ken was arrested the military broke down my restaurant door and
looted everything. I was not in that day but my wife and daughter and
workers were and they were all beaten mercilessly.
        Some men, chiefs who had been paid off, took up hatred against
me. A search was declared for me and I went into hiding. Only my wife
knew where I was. I fell sick because I was always in the bush. A
terrible fever came on me. I asked my wife for medical help and a woman
came from the hospital but she was only a janitor. She did not know what
she was doing when she gave me the injection and I swelled up, a very
big problem came over me and I couldn't go to the hospital because I was
wanted. I was very ill. My life was in danger. I had to leave that
country. Since I have been here I have talked just once to my wife.

Yereba Kina

        As an Ogoni I have spent my last 33 years on earth and have been
through most of these experiences. There are gas flares all over Kpean,
my home village, and a Shell flow station there. As the gas flares it
eliminates the night; it turns the sky an eerie orange. I have seen that
24 hours a day seven days a week. It was not a question of somebody
telling me about Shell. I have lived it, it has always been around me.
Pipelines angle for more spaces than human beings in our villages as
they run ubiqitously through their length and breadth. Even as a child I
remember an elderly woman was cut in half by a burst oil pipe. And this
is the place that sustains Nigeria! Absurd as it is, Shell finds it more
convenient to do business in an ethical vaccuum.
        This has been happening since 1958. Before Ken nothing was done
to solve the problems. We have over 450,000 people illiterate -- that is
almost the whole population -- and that is why Shell and the government
have succeeded in devestating us for so long. When MOSOP came on stream
it was a dream come true, a dream to redeem the Ogoni and fight to claim
what belongs to us. Through Ken the Ogoni became aware of our
deprivations. It was a cognate experience that derived from an
invaluable recognition that we had been cheated. That is why the
government took the steps it took -- to fight our vision.
        Joining MOSOP was a moral imperative. Noone had to convince me.
I worked in the mainstream press as an assistant features editor with
Vanguard, a newspaper published in Nigeria's former capital city, Lagos,
so I was in a position to be instrumental in publicizing the movement,
and that brought the hammer down on me. (See Kina's sidebar review of
Ken Saro-Wiwa's new book about the Ogoni struggle.)  I wrote my first
story after our village was overrun -- our block houses were turned to
rubble and my stepmother was killed.
        There were members of MOSOP who backslided and reported the
things I was doing. On four accasions I was invited by security agents
for questioning. The last time was December 23, 1995. Two men came to my
office to see me in the guise of wanting to place ads. They said they
would prefer to talk downstairs. Two other men were waiting downstairs
and they identified themselves as security agents. Fortunately for me
the superior officer was from the Niger Delta too and had suffered the
same problems. He said, "My friend, I understand what you are doing but
this is my job and I must advise you to stop." I gave my word and they
let me go.
        Then on January 4 I did another piece on Ken and that was the
last straw. They came again. Fortunately for me I knew what was coming
and eased out of the office. My editor called and said, "Don't come
back." He also advised me not to go to my house for a detachment had
been there. That was the beginning of my problems. I could not go to my
office and I could not go home. By that time I knew I had been declared
wanted, though unofficially, and I was in quite a fix. You see, I had
never contemplated leaving the country. I was not in the least prepared;
I only had what I wore to work to day and these sandals and they are the
only things that came with me.

Godfrey Taneh

My experiences are not peculiar. As an Ogoni you don't need anybody to
tell you that your problems come from oil exploration. Our people are
mostly farmers and fishermen and these activities are devestated when
the land and sea are no longer healthy. Shell lays pipes, there are
eruptions, eruptions detroy neighboring compounds. Our family has taken
people into refuge under these conditions. These experiences go on most
of the time. So when we heard of MOSOP we all became excited and
contributed in our own ways to make sure the movement succeeded.
        I worked in the same city as Kina, the former capital city,
Lagos, for the largest insurance company in the whole of Africa. It is
100% owned by the federal government so I was a civil servant. It was
difficult to actively participate in MOSOP as a civil servant; we had to
operate under disguise. I was secretary of an underground organization
largely involved with publicity. Most of our success came from
international affiliations and we needed to be in contact with them. My
work depended on my relationship with colleagues and acquintances, to
get people to help by printing and faxing documents. Our corporation was
largely staffed with people from the majority tribes which do not agree
with our struggle, though on an individual basis people might prove
supportive.
        As Ogoni we have a very distinct culture. It is easy to identify
us, even through our names. After they hanged Ken they thought it was
all over, they had killed the vocal one, but by January 4 after Ken's
death, which the movement celebrates as Ogoni Day, we mobilized again.
The government was highly embarassed and intensified the repression of
all who bear Ogoni names, especially in the city. They can just come on
you at midnight before you have time to put away your materials, so it
was best to go undergound, and then finally we had to flee the country.
        In this country, the experiences are completely new. In my
country, in my profession, a separate person was deployed as computer
operator. So we were deprived of the use of computers, which here are
everywhere. We find here that people want to see you as inadequate, that
you do not belong. That is the biggest problem, apart from the American
accent and the fact that we are blacks.

James Uebari

When I was born, my parents told me about one man who wanted to liberate
the Ogoni, Timothy Birabi. This man started our struggle. Then later Ken
became aware of it and it has been his problem all this while.
        In 1990 Ken formed MOSOP and presented the Ogoni Bill of Rights
to the government and Shell and received no reply whatsoever.  We
students at the University of Port Harcourt became seriously involved in
the struggle. Our role was to enlghten people. Ken was most of the time
away from home, campaigning on the outside. When he was in Nigeria he
would meet with us and discuss all he had done abroad. Ken would call
the Ogoni students to his house and tell us how we could assist, take
responsibility. I was a member of the National Youth Council of Ogoni
and secretary of the National Union of Ogoni Students. We would hold
meetings in the villages, disseminate information from Ken to them, from
headquarters to the kingdom level.
        January 4, 1993, was our first protest march. We were
priviledged to celebrate that day with other indigenous groups. Over
300,000 people showed up.  The government came to see Ken as someone who
threatened their existence so they began arresting him and confiscating
his passport. There were also Ogoni, elderly people whom we had
respected, who took money from the government and got into playing a
dual role. We attacked them as vultures. When MOSOP formed they thought
they might meet with government for their own benefit but they saw that
Ken did not work that way, so they disassociated themselves from Ken.
        In May 1994 the government put some vultures up to disorganizing
a MOSOP rally in Gokana. They held their own meeting at the same time,
same place. Ken was stopped by soldiers on the way and told to go back
to the city. He quietly left. When the message that Ken had been turned
back got to the boys, they stormed the vultures in the presence of the
Nigerian military, and four of the conservative leaders were killed. Ken
and the others who were arrested were not even there, they were in the
motorcade going back to the city. Other vultures were paid to give false
witness against them.
        I was in Lagos doing my compulsory government service when the
sentence to kill Ken was passed. I wanted to travel home to see how
things were going. When we got to Port Harcourt we were told not to put
on black or carry a radio or newspaper. If we did, we would be beaten.
They wanted to cut Ogoni off from the news of the world and silence any
mourning for Ken. I did travel with someone who was wearing black and
carrying a newspaper and what I saw, I could not bear. He was beaten
almost to death.
        When Ogoni Day next came we came out in emasse. It was our
mourning day since we had not been able to mourn before. The government
sent troops but we defied them. There were killings; we saw at least six
bodies in our kingdom and heard reports of others in the river.
Meanwhile the vultures were given money to bring out anyone known to be
an Ogoni activist. We were known; we had come out openly to confront
certain people we saw as enemies. My own name was included on the list
of those declared wanted. Ogoni was everywhere filled with soldiers
well-armed and instructed to shoot on sight anyone declared wanted.
There was nothing I could do. I had to leave home.

Douglass Ikeh

Ken united our youth to tell the people what has happening to Ogoni
because of the oil. The pollution and gas flares. How we have no
hospitals, water, electricity, yet we are the place all the money comes
from. We youth would tell our parents and other people at the grassroots
level. We would tell villagers Shell will not come get our oil again,
that our place must be renovated, the pipes must be buried, nothing more
done to endanger our people.
        I became very active and my activity became known. Then one day
I was called in by a chief who told me, "Ken is a rich man. Why is a
young boy like you following him? Shell can give you money, get you a
living going fine." I said, "I don't want their money. How can we take
money when people are dying?  What about our extended families at home?
How do you feel about how they are living?" That very chief later
identified me and because of that I had to exit the country.
        As we became successful, Shell and the government sponsored
other ethnic groups to harass us and disturb our movement. We saw
massive abuses. Last August there was massive destruction in the part of
Port Harcourt where the Ogoni live, and the ammunition and guns were not
local; they were big guns from the government. Many people were left
without homes. We have 30,000 internal refugees now and 14 villages have
been destroyed.
        My father was generous to the movement and he was a MOSOP member
at the local level. He donated land as a MOSOP meeting area. Now my
father and mother's building is no more. Most of their property has been
destroyed. Even my own mother has just one dress and lives under a shed.
Most people are living that way in Ogoni now. Security people and
soldiers are free to rape the girls and loot the people. This is mainly
what is happening in Nigeria now. That is why we wish to let the world
know what is really happening, and to see whether the international
community will do anything to stop Shell and the Nigerian military
government.


</pre>