Nigeria, Oil, and the US

Red River Hogs, Afi Mountain Wildlife Sanctuary

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In Nigeria, the CFO of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has been arrested for $7.2 billion in refineries maintenance fraud. Phew, that’s dollars not naira, a lot of money even for the oil industry. The NNPC kind of, sort of, has run the oil industry for fifty years. It was founded by the military regime back in 1971 and has been a relative disaster for Nigeria ever since.

The CFO was arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). They were founded in 2002 with Nigeria's return to civilian rule. While it may seem a good idea to create such an entity, it’s basically a sign you have much deeper problems that in the end such an entity will not be able to solve. When I learned about the EFCC in my first Nigerian campaign, I contemplated what would happen if you created such an entity, a functioning one, in the US. Sheesh, it'd close down both DC and New York to start with.

So now you ask, “Joe, as a good American why should I care what happens in Nigeria?” A question all good Americans will ask. Well, for the simple reason that for over a quarter of a century, anytime you, as an American, filled your tank with gas, a gallon of it came from Nigeria. The extraction of that oil and the money it provided created both environmental and political havoc, devastating the Delta and funding decades of despotic military rule.

A good friend recently sent a great Nigerian podcast, The Republic. It's an excellent take on Ken Saro Wiwa. Wiwa confronted the military government in the 90s for the destruction and inequity caused by oil extraction in Ogoniland and the rest of the Delta. He was hung for his efforts. The report is a very well done piece of Nigerian and very much American history. Maybe most relevant, it's a story about democratic organizing, a lost political art in America.

Ken Saro Wiwa

A note to Nigerians – I still find it endlessly amusing when Tinubu talks about rooting out corruption. If anything else, this is most likely about the right people not getting enough money.

Thanks much to Akintayo for both Red River Hogs pix and podcast link.

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