The Politics of Bones: Dr. Owens Wiwa and the Struggle for Nigeria's Oil is a book by Canadian journalist J. Timothy Hunt. It was published by McClelland & Stewart in September 2005 just before the tenth anniversary of the controversial execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa.
James Timothy Hunt is an American-Canadian author and journalist. He has also written children's books under the pen name Tim Beiser.
McClelland & Stewart Limited is a Canadian publishing company. It is owned by Random House of Canada, a branch of Random House, the international book publishing division of German media giant Bertelsmann.
Kenule Beeson "Ken" Saro-Wiwa was a Nigerian writer, television producer, environmental activist, and winner of the Right Livelihood Award and the Goldman Environmental Prize. Saro-Wiwa was a member of the Ogoni people, an ethnic minority in Nigeria whose homeland, Ogoniland, in the Niger Delta has been targeted for crude oil extraction since the 1950s and which has suffered extreme environmental damage from decades of indiscriminate petroleum waste dumping. Initially as spokesperson, and then as president, of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), Saro-Wiwa led a nonviolent campaign against environmental degradation of the land and waters of Ogoniland by the operations of the multinational petroleum industry, especially the Royal Dutch Shell company. He was also an outspoken critic of the Nigerian government, which he viewed as reluctant to enforce environmental regulations on the foreign petroleum companies operating in the area.
On November 10, 1995, Nigeria’s military dictatorship executed nine environmental activists. Among them was Ken Saro-Wiwa, the charismatic spokesman of the Ogoni people, whose land in the fertile Niger River delta has been grotesquely polluted by the Royal Dutch Shell Corporation. During Ken’s incarceration, his brother, Dr. Owens Wiwa, fought valiantly to save his life. When his quest failed, Owens narrowly escaped Nigeria with his life, first to London, and then to Toronto.
Nigeria, officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal republic in West Africa, bordering Niger in the north, Chad in the northeast, Cameroon in the east, and Benin in the west. Its coast in the south is located on the Gulf of Guinea in the Atlantic Ocean. The federation comprises 36 states and 1 Federal Capital Territory, where the capital, Abuja is located. Nigeria is officially a democratic secular country.
Royal Dutch Shell plc, commonly known as Shell, is a British-Dutch oil and gas company headquartered in the Netherlands and incorporated in the United Kingdom. It is one of the six oil and gas "supermajors" and the fifth-largest company in the world measured by 2018 revenues. Shell was first in the 2013 Fortune Global 500 list of the world's largest companies; in that year its revenues were equivalent to 84% of the Dutch national $556 billion GDP.
Monday Owens Wiwa is a medical doctor and human rights activist. He is the brother of executed Ogoni leader Ken Saro-Wiwa, and the son of Ogoni chief Jim Wiwa. Wiwa is an internationally renowned expert on the effects of globalisation, especially as it relates to the highly controversial business practices of Royal Dutch Shell in the Niger Delta. Vice-chairman of the Toronto chapter of the Sierra Club Canada and an active member of Amnesty International, Wiwa is frequently called upon to advocate for development programs in Canada and abroad and to campaign for increased corporate responsibility. This work has taken him to Ireland, which he visits in support of the Shell to Sea campaign. Currently, he is the Country Director for the Clinton Health Access Initiative in Nigeria.
The Politics of Bones documents Owens's personal battle against the Nigerian government to locate his brother's remains after they were buried in an unmarked mass-grave. Over the torturous course of ten years, Owens finally succeeded in locating and properly burying his brother in the summer of 2005.
The Ogoni Nine were a group of nine activists from the Ogoni region of Nigeria who opposed the operating practices of the Royal Dutch Shell oil corporation. Their members included outspoken author and playwright Ken Saro-Wiwa, Saturday Dobee, Nordu Eawo, Daniel Gbooko, Paul Levera, Felix Nuate, Baribor Bera, Barinem Kiobel, and John Kpuine, who were executed by hanging in 1995 by the military dictatorship of General Sani Abacha and buried in Port Harcourt Cemetery.
The Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People, also known as (MOSOP), is a mass‐based social movement organization of the indigenous Ogoni people of Central Niger Delta. MOSOP is the umbrella organization of currently 11 member groups representing more than 700,000 indigenous Ogoni in campaigning for social, economic and environmental justice in the Niger Delta of Nigeria. MOSOP's mandated use of non-violent methods to promote democratic principles assist Ogoni people pursue rights of self-determination in environmental issues in the Niger Delta, cultural rights and practices for Ogoni people.
The Ogoni people are one of the many indigenous peoples in the region of southeast Nigeria. They now number about over two million people and live in a 404-square-mile (1,050 km2) homeland which they also refer to as Ogoni, or Ogoniland. They share common oil-related environmental problems with the Ijaw people of Niger Delta.
The current conflict in the Niger Delta first arose in the early 1990s over tensions between foreign oil corporations and a number of the Niger Delta's minority ethnic groups who feel they are being exploited, particularly the Ogoni and the Ijaw. Ethnic and political unrest has continued throughout the 1990s despite the conversion to democracy and the election of the Obasanjo government in 1999. Competition for oil wealth has fueled violence between ethnic groups, causing the militarization of nearly the entire region by ethnic militia groups, Nigerian military and police forces, notably the Nigerian Mobile Police. The violence has contributed to Nigeria's ongoing energy supply crisis by discouraging foreign investment in new power generation plants in the region.
Jim Beeson Wiwa was a chief of the Ogoni people of southern Nigeria, and the chairman of the Council of Chiefs of Bane. He was born in Bane. He was the father of executed playwright and environmentalist Ken Saro-Wiwa and of doctor and human-rights activist Owens Wiwa, and the grandfather of journalist Ken Wiwa.
Bori is a city in Khana Local Government Area, Rivers State, southern Nigeria. It is the birthplace of author and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa.
Junior Relaxer is the third album by Canadian alternative rock band King Cobb Steelie, released in 1997. The album's main single, Rational, was the band's biggest hit.
Major Isaac Jasper Adaka Boro, fondly called "Boro", was a Nigerian nationalist, Ijaw, and soldier. He was one of the pioneers of minority rights activism in Nigeria.
The Wiwa family lawsuits against Royal Dutch Shell were three separate lawsuits brought by the family of Ken Saro-Wiwa against Royal Dutch Shell, its subsidiary Shell Nigeria and the subsidiary's CEO Brian Anderson, in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York under the Alien Tort Statute, the Torture Victim Protection Act of 1992 and Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). They were charged with complicity in human rights abuses against the Ogoni people in the Niger Delta, including summary execution, crimes against humanity, torture, inhumane treatment, arbitrary arrest, wrongful death, and assault and battery. The lawsuits were filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and co-counsel from EarthRights International in 1996, and after 12 years of Shell petitioning the court not to hear the cases, they were heard 26 May 2009.
Platform London is an interdisciplinary London-based art and campaigning collective founded in 1983 that creates projects with social justice and environmental justice themes. Platform describes itself as "bringing together environmentalists, artists, human rights campaigners, educationalists and community activists to create innovative projects driven by the need for social and environmental justice. This interdisciplinary approach combines the transformatory power of art with the tangible goals of campaigning, the rigour of in-depth research with the vision to promote alternative futures."
Judith Brown Chomsky is an American human rights lawyer. She was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1942, and is the sister-in-law of MIT professor Noam Chomsky. She became involved with politics when she participated in demonstrations in the 1950s for the right of African-Americans to use non-segregated lunch counters.
Lt. Colonel Dauda Musa Komo was Administrator of Rivers State, Nigeria from December 1993 to August 1996 during the military regime of General Sani Abacha. He took office at a time of escalating violence between the Ogoni and Okrika people over crowded waterfront land, combined with Ogoni protest against Shell Oil activities and the environmental destruction of Ogoni land. He reacted aggressively, sending troops to break up demonstrations and arresting leaders of the Ogoni's MOSOP movement.
Gokana kingdom is one of the six kingdoms of the Ogoni people in Ogoni in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. "Gokana kingdom" has geographic, historic and ethno-linguistic elements with some 130,000 Gokana language speakers located in the Gokana Local Government Area in Rivers State. Gokana contains a number of villages, including Lewe, B. Dere, K. Dere, Kpor, Mogho, Bomu, Bodo, Gio-koo, Nwe-ol, Alli D. Bera, Biara, Deeyor, Boghor, Barako and Yeghe.
This is a list of notable events relating to the environment in 1995. They relate to environmental law, conservation, environmentalism and environmental issues.
Six awards were awarded in the categories: National Print; Periodicals; Photojournalism; Radio; Television Documentary; and Television News.
Port Harcourt Cemetery is a city-owned and operated public cemetery located along Aggrey Road in the Old Township district of Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital. It is the oldest cemetery still in use in the city and is notable as the burial site of activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and his associates. It also contains one commonwealth burial of the 1939 - 1945 World War.
Wiwa may refer to:
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
