Following the murders of the Ogoni chiefs, Rivers State military administrator, Lieutenant Colonel Dauda Musa Komo, and the Abacha regime finally had their way in to disrupt MOSOP. On May 22 1994, Komo held a press conference, where he accused MOSOP of the murders. But how did the government decide who to arrest? The fifth episode of the second season of The Republic is now available wherever you listen to podcasts.
Illustration by Sarah Kanu with design by Dami Moji for THE REPUBLIC.
Our central dilemma is how were the Ogoni 8 (the Ogoni 9 excluding Ken Saro-Wiwa) involved in MOSOP and the Ogoni agitation?
INTRODUCTION
WALE LAWAL
How much do you know about the eight men who were executed alongside Ken Saro-Wiwa in 1995?
DR GENTLE WILSON KOMI
Okay, the other members. You know, I was still a small boy, and I didn’t know them one-on-one, but I have been reading about them, like Kpuinen and the rest of them, I’ve been reading about them, and whenever I hear those names, I say, Ah, are you one of them? Ah, was he your uncle? And so it’s been a pain, and I think all of them should be immortalized. All of them deserved to be immortalized for the sacrifice they made.
WALE LAWAL
Do you know their names? Their stories? Were they members of MOSOP? If they were, when did they join MOSOP? Why did they join the movement?
FEGALO NSUKE
Essentially, no, most of them were artisans. And yes, they were artisans and sympathetic to the struggle of the Ogoni. One of them was a leader of the National Youth Council of Ogoni People, which is the youth wing of MOSOP. And that is Reverend John Kpuinen. He was a reverend. The other person was a serving commissioner in the Rivers State government under Dauda Musa Komo, that is Dr. Barinem Kiobel.
WALE LAWAL
What you just heard is a snippet from my interview with Fegalo Nsuke, who was the MOSOP leader between 2019 and 2023. Through his account, I’m reminded of the Haitian anthropologist, Michel-Rolph Trouillot, who once wrote that, ‘history is a fragile and contested terrain, where power determines whose stories are heard and whose are silenced.’
INTRODUCTION
Hello and welcome to The Republic, a podcast about pivotal African figures and historical events. I’m your host, Wale Lawal. In seven episodes, I’m going to walk you through one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in Nigeria’s history: the Abacha regime’s execution of the Ogoni 9 in 1995. To experience what happened, we’ll explore the life and legacy of Ken Saro-Wiwa, and the significance of the Ogoni struggle against oil companies and their environmental degradation of the Niger Delta.
EPISODE 5: THE OGONI 8
THE EMERGENCE OF THE OGONI 9
PROF TOYIN FALOLA
They were condemned as murderers, dangerous activists, enemy of the state, enemy of companies.
WALE LAWAL
Even in his statement to the Ogoni Civil Disturbances Tribunal, Saro-Wiwa stated, and I’m going to quote this:
This case of homicide was the pretext for the Internal Security Task Force to invade every single Ogoni village and to loot, rape, burn and kill unarmed men, women and children. The Commander of the Task Force, Major Okuntimo has himself publicly confessed to these crimes.
Following the murders of the Ogoni chiefs, Rivers State Military Administrator Lieutenant Colonel Dauda Musa Komo and the Abacha regime finally had their way in to disrupt MOSOP. On 22 May 1994, Komo held a press conference, where he accused the leaders of MOSOP of the murder, using a bag of bones retrieved from the scene of the crime.
LT COLONEL KOMO
Ogoni is bleeding and not by genocidal federal troops, as some of the papers carried some days back, but by some irresponsible and reckless MOSOP elements, which must stop immediately. I therefore call on you to report accurately this event and to stop being used as propaganda tools conveniently for some dictators like Ken Saro-Wiwa.
WALE LAWAL
At this point, you might be wondering: How did the government decide who to arrest and whether there was any strategic thinking at all. Well… {dramatic pause}
WALE LAWAL
According to The Politics of Bones by J. Timothy Hunt, one of the Ogoni 9, John Kpuinen, was recorded telling Saro-Wiwa’s brother, Dr. Owens Wiwa that, and I’m going to quote this:
Lieutenant Colonel Komo doesn’t care about sense. He doesn’t care that Ken and MOSOP didn’t know anything about this meeting in Giokoo. He doesn’t care that most of the MOSOP activists were waiting for Ken in Bodo, which is miles away from Giokoo.
WALE LAWAL
The initial arrests included Saro-Wiwa, who was President of MOSOP and Ledum Mitee,the Vice President of MOSOP. These men were taken into custody while other accused men such as Saro-Wiwa’s brother Dr. Owens Wiwa were on a wanted list. In fact, on 22 May 1994, the headline of the Daily Times newspaper read: ‘11 Ogoni Leaders Wanted!’. The wanted list triggered a brutal witch hunt, and as long as you were Ogoni or sympathetic to the Ogoni cause, no one in Nigeria was safe.
In one month, the Rivers State Inland Security Task Force or RSIS undertook what Amnesty International called, ‘deliberate terrorism’ while they searched for possible suspects of the murder. In 2008, Thompson Ayodele reported in This Day newspaper that RSIS had killed at least 2,000 civilians, had destroyed about 30 villages, and had detained over 600 Ogonis with 100,000 Ogonis becoming internal refugees.
WALE LAWAL
At the tribunal, Saro-Wiwa’s statement was even more damning of the government. According to Saro-Wiwa, and this is a quote:
Hundreds of Ogoni men, women and children were shot by the Nigerian troops in cold blood; many were maimed, and hundreds of thousands were driven into the bush. Money was extorted from the over 600 men who were detained and tortured in special detention centres established for the purpose at Kpor and Bori, and as yet an unspecified number of Ogoni people were driven out of government and private sector employment. Many houses were destroyed and a lot of private property looted. Villages were forced to pay protection money in order to escape Major (as he then was) Okuntimo.
The quote ends.
WALE LAWAL
Over the next nine months, between June 1994 and April 1995, the military government narrowed the number of suspects to 15 men which included Ken Saro-Wiwa, Ledum Mitee, Dr. Barinem Kiobel, John Kpuinen, Baribor Bera, Felix Nuate, Paul Levula, Daniel Gbooko, Nordu Eawo, Saturday Dobee, Monday Donwin, Joseph Kpante, Michael Vizor, Albert Kabrara and Pogbara Afa.
Some Ogonis protested the illegal incarceration of these men and called for their release. But the Abacha government continued their complete disregard of the rule of law. Ogonis who continued to protest were met with equal brutality. MOSOP leader, Fegalo Nsuke, told me that:
FEGALO NSUKE
Those who were putting themselves together to protest against the detention of Ken and the arrest of these people who were in detention, some of them were killed. And by the end of the day, with our last count as at 1999, we lost about 4000 Ogonis in that state repression. So they killed a lot of people, and it became so difficult for people to really come out in protest. They were courageous to still come out. But it was like the army that was in charge of the military task force that was stationed in Ogoni, Major Paul Okuntimo, was just out to kill anybody that was MOSOP or that was sympathetic to MOSOP.
WALE LAWAL
Within the international community, there were calls for the release of these men and appeals made to Abacha. Amnesty International reported that, ‘the prosecutions appear to be politically motivated and the proceedings and decisions of the special tribunal set up specifically to try the cases do not satisfy international standards for fair trial.’
WALE LAWAL
The government had tortured and starved these men. Some of the detained men became ill as a result of their torture and were denied access to doctors and their lawyers for months. Baribor Bera, for example, showed up to his tribunal hearing in February 1995 with scars from having been whipped with a koboko…
During the trial in October 1995, the Special Military Tribunal delivered its verdicts. Justice Ibrahim Auta, found Ledum Mitee, Monday Donwin, Joseph Kpante, Michael Vizor, Albert Kabrara and Pogbara Afa not guilty of the charges. Whereas Ken Saro-Wiwa, Dr. Barinem Kiobel, John Kpuinen, Baribor Bera, Felix Nuate, Paul Levula, Daniel Gbooko, Nordu Eawo and Saturday Dobee, the Ogoni 9, were found guilty, and sentenced to death by hanging.
THE OGONI 8
WALE LAWAL
Like much of Nigerian history, the specifics of Ogoni written history is limited. But within it, there are elements scarcer than others. Elements for instance like the stories of the eight men that were executed with Saro-Wiwa. We know quite a bit about Saro-Wiwa but who were these other men? How were they involved in MOSOP and implicated in the murder of the four chiefs? Through his book The Politics of Bones, J Timothy Hunt, provides some insight.
WALE LAWAL
Let’s start with Dr. Barinem Kiobel. Before he was killed, Dr. Kiobel served as Commissioner of Commerce and Tourism and was a member of the Rivers State Executive Council. Dr. Kiobel had only just been appointed commissioner on the day the Ogoni chiefs were murdered… He was present at the site of the mob. MOSOP leader, Nsuke, told me that Dr. Kiobel had arrived for a meeting to plan how he and another prominent Ogoni man could be honored by the community.
FEGALO NSUKE
I think the meeting in Giokoo was being called to discuss how they can honour Dr. Kiobel, and that’s probably what might have brought him there. But the story I got is that when the incident happened, Kiobel also ran away from there. And when he left there, he didn’t run directly to the Government House. So by the time he arrived at Government House, the Governor of Rivers State had gotten the information that there had been a killing in Ogoni, and they just pointed at him and said he was at the meeting, and that is how he was arrested. There wasn’t really any allegation against him other than that. He was in Gokana on that day.
WALE LAWAL
Dr. Kiobel held a government post when he was arrested. He also served as a mediator between the Ogoni people, the government and Shell.
He was a vocal critic of Shell’s operations in Ogoni and according to his wife, Esther Kiobel, he had rejected bribes from the company. Shockingly, Dr. Biobel was not a member of MOSOP. In fact, on the day of the murder, Dr. Kiobel had gone to the police station in Bori to report the violence and seek help.
J Timothy Hunt noted in The Politics of Bones, ‘s for Dr. Barinem Kiobel, although he had an iron-clad alibi (he had gone to the police station in Bori to inform the authorities that the murders were taking place), the tribunal concluded that he had planned the very crime he’d reported.’
WALE LAWAL
According to Michael Birnbaum KC, a British criminal lawyer who observed the trials, the evidence provided during the trial supported Dr Kiobel’s claim that he was trying to help end the violence. According to The Politics of Bones, Dr. Kiobel had ‘no motive whatsoever’ to murder the Chiefs.
WALE LAWAL
So why did Dr. Barinem Kiobel find himself accused of murder and executed for a crime he did not commit? It was mainly political. In her 2016 interview with Amnesty international, his wife, Esther Kiobel claimed that his open criticism of the military government and Shell’s operation in Ogoniland and his refusal to cooperate with the government agenda against Saro-Wiwa led to his capture and eventual execution.
WALE LAWAL
According to Esther Kiobel, while Dr. Barinem Kiobel was at the gallows, he said, ‘tell my wife, I love her.’. In The Politics of Bones, Dr. Kiobel’s last words are recorded to have been ‘God, I am innocent! God, I am innocent!’Amnesty International described Dr Kiobel as a ’prisoner of conscience’.
WALE LAWAL
Second, John Kpuinen. Kpuinen was a young Ogoni man and an activist from Bera, who rose to become the Deputy President of National Youth Council of Ogoni People – NYCOP. He worked closely with Saro-Wiwa. He used his expertise as a microbiologist and virologist to highlight the environmental and health impacts of oil pollution in Gokana. He even had a research paper titled, ‘Organic Pollution of Surface and Ground Water in Gokana’.
WALE LAWAL
So how did Kpuinen end up arrested? Well many members of MOSOP had gone into hiding and had effectively become fugitives within Nigeria. In The Politics of Bones, Dr Owens Wiwa said that (and this is a quote):
Kpuinen never kept his mouth shut the entire time he was in Lagos. Whether playing checkers in a barroom or sitting with strangers in a restaurant, Kpuinen constantly talked about his exploits as deputy president of NYCOP and boasted of how MOSOP had driven Shell out of Ogoniland.
WALE LAWAL
As a result, Kpuinen was betrayed by one of the people he had confided in. According to Hunt’s book, Kupinen’s confidant happened to be a close friend of a Lagos policeman who was related to one of the murdered chiefs. And so, Kpuinen was found in his hideout close to Dodan Barracks and was taken into custody. Kpuinen denied all allegations of instigating and taking part in the murders as he was not present.
WALE LAWAL
The third was Baribor Bera, an activist from Gokana, and a dedicated member of MOSOP. According to his wife, Victoria, he was committed to improving conditions in Ogoniland. As a member of NYCOP, Baribor Bera advocated for the rights of young people within the Ogoni community. According to ThePolitics of Bones, Baribor Bera was arrested and brought to the Bori Camp in January 1995.
After Baribor Bera was executed, Victoria Bera presented a statement at The Hague recorded by Amnesty International. In the statement, she said:
My husband fought for better conditions in Ogoniland and for better opportunities for young people. MOSOP wanted a fair share of the benefits from oil. In Ogoniland we have nothing at all. We don’t have light, we don’t have water. Shell and Nigeria were cheating on us. They took the oil and we got nothing out of it.
WALE LAWAL
According to The Politics of Bones, Baribor Bera was tortured into signing a confession against Saro-Wiwa. Prison officials extracted his teeth one by one until he agreed to become a witness for the prosecution. However, Okuntimo’s men chose to convert him into one of the defendants as he refused to give false evidence.
According to Amnesty International’s reports on the trials, the prosecution had accused Baribor Bera of leading the mob that carried out the murder. But, Baribor Bera denied any involvement with the mob and stated that he had tried to prevent the violence.
WALE LAWAL
The fourth was Felix Nuate, an Ogoni man from Loko. He was a trader and a farmer. According to his wife, Friday Nuate, he was an ordinary member of MOSOP.
WALE LAWAL
The fifth detainee was Paul Levula. Levula was born in Cameroon to Ogoni parents. He returned to Ogoniland to fight against the exploitation of Ogoni by Shell. According to Amnesty’s report, Levula worked as a clerical officer at a health clinic at Bomu. He denied the charges, but some prosecution witnesses including Peter Fii, Uzormah Kpekpe, and Alhaji Mohammed Kobani testified against him and Levula was found guilty.
WALE LAWAL
The sixth detainee was Daniel Nassi-ol Gbooko, a farmer, cassava processor and electrician in Bera. He was renowned for his devout Christian faith. Gbooko was illegally arrested in his shop by Major Okuntimo on 23 May 1994 and accused of crimes he denied committing.
According to Amnesty’s report on the trial, Gbooko denied being a member of MOSOP but said his brother might have signed him up for a NYCOP membership while he was in the hospital. Amnesty International also reported that Gbooko was carried into the trial by his co-defendants as he was severely ill from the continuous beatings and assaults he suffered while in custody. It seemed as though Gbooko was singled out as a scapegoat.
WALE LAWAL
The seventh detainee, Nordu Eawo was from Nwe-ol. Eawo was a member of NYCOP and an activist who campaigned tirelessly for the rights of the Ogoni People. According to Amnesty International’s report on the trials, during the tribunal held on 7 July 1995, he testified that he was beaten and severely physically assaulted by prosecution witnesses. Following his assault he was denied access to adequate medical care.
According to Hunt’s The Politics of Bones, Saro-Wiwa and Eawo had an interaction while in custody. It went like this:
Nordu Eawo burst into tears. ‘So are we to die like this?’ he sobbed.‘Don’t cry,’ said Ken. ‘It is an honour to die for Ogoni. We will live forever in the minds of those we are leaving behind.
The final detainee, Saturday Menele Dobee, was a security guard at a bank in Bori. He denied being affiliated with MOSOP. But he did admit to knowing Ken Saro-Wiwa ‘in-person’ based on his statement. Despite his denial of affiliation, he was arrested and found guilty.
WALE LAWAL
Dr. Barinem Kiobel, John Kpuinen, Baribor Bera, Felix Nuate, Paul Levula, Daniel Gbooko, Nordu Eawo and Saturday Dobee. All eight men were hanged alongside Ken Saro-Wiwa on 10 November 1995.
WALE LAWAL
During my research for this podcast, we contacted the family members of these men. Although some agreed to speak to us, we were ultimately unable to have the interviews due to scheduling conflicts.
THE OGONI 8 FAMILIES
WALE LAWAL
With the execution of the Ogoni 9, their families were forced to flee for safety while navigating their losses, their indignation and their grief.
WALE LAWAL
According to reports several wives of the Ogoni Nine gave, many of these families lived as refugees in neighboring countries like Cameroon and Benin Republic, before seeking asylum and resettling in North America and Europe. Victoria Bera, widow of Baribor Bera, recalled her experience to Amnesty International. Her house was destroyed by the military in early 1996 and she fled with her son to Benin, where they lived in a United Nations Human Rights Council {UNHRC} refugee camp for over two years before being resettled in Canada.
Here’s Funbi, who wrote this episode with me, reading from Victoria’s Statement.
FUNBI AKINSANYA
Having a small child on my own was very difficult. He would ask continuously about his dad, ‘Mum, where is my dad? Who killed him? Did you kill him? Tell me who killed my dad.’ I could only cry. That was the hardest part of that period, even harder than finding money to eat and take care of him. Those words stuck with me and will never leave me. I did my best to give him a normal life. But he kept pointing at his friends having a father and at his own loneliness.
WALE LAWAL
Like Victoria Bera, Esther Kiobel, Dr. Barinem Kiobel’s wife, fled to Benin with her children for refuge before they were granted asylum in the U.S. Esther filed a case against Shell in New York in 2002, but, in 2013, the U.S.’ Supreme Court ruled that the U.S. did not have the jurisdiction to hear the case. Still, Esther did not give up.
WALE LAWAL
Years after the Ogoni 9 execution, some of the wives of the Ogoni 9 continued to fight to clear their husbands’ names, and for justice against Shell’s complicity in their husbands’ judicial murder and Shell’s environmental damage in Ogoni. In 2017, with support from Amnesty International, Esther Kiobel, Victoria Bera, Blessing Eawo and Charity Levula brought a new lawsuit against Shell. They accused Shell of being instrumental in the unlawful arrest and detention of their husbands; the violation of their husbands’ physical integrity; and the violation of their right to a fair trial and to life, as well as their own right to a family life. .
Amnesty International’s Head of Business and Human Rights, Mark Dummett described these women saying, and this is a quote:
These extraordinarily brave women are not giving up. Their voices have been heard. They should be commended for the invaluable work they have done to highlight the global culture of impunity for multinationals accused of human rights abuses.
WALE LAWAL
According to the 2023 documentary film, Esther and The Law by Tatiana Scheltema, at some point, Esther was offered a $700,000 settlement by Shell, which she refused. In the documentary film, she explained that, ‘Shell has my husband’s blood on his hands. I want them to be held accountable for that.’
WALE LAWAL
In 2022, the case was dismissed, and Esther Kiobel considered the case a victory. In an interview she gave to the BBC, she said, ‘even though the judgment went against me, it is still a victory, my voice has been heard, the truth is out, Shell needs to go and clean their mess…’
That line, ‘the truth is out’ reminded me of Saro-Wiwa’s own statement about how despite killing the Ogoni Nine, the government would not be able to extinguish the Ogoni 9’s message. Dr. Gentle Komi who I met at the university of Port Harcourt had more context.
DR GENTLE WILSON KOMI
‘Ken Saro-Wiwa was hanged with another eight, to make all the Ogoni Nine. They were hanged, sentenced to death by hanging. That was like capital punishment for no reason, because you want to silence a people. He said, yes, you can kill the messenger, but you cannot kill the message. The messengers were killed.’
WALE LAWAL
The Ogoni 9’s message survived and in large part because of women like Esther Kiobel and their refusal to be silenced.
ESTHER KIOBEL ON HER FIGHT
I am speaking with the spirits of the Ogoni 9 and I vow with my husband blood and their blood will follow me to fight the battle. So we come here. I go round all the villages, so I want make everybody wey know everything about this thing, to come to give evidence. Even people wey go give evidence today are at risk, they have to be safe.
CONCLUSION
WALE LAWAL
Chinua Achebe reminds us that ‘until the lions have their own historians, the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.’ So what is the legacy of these eight men in Ogoni today? I asked Dum Syl Aminikpo, who leads the Ken Saro-Wiwa Foundation in Port Harcourt.
DUM SYL AMINIKPO
Although the Ogoni four and the other eight are not so popular, But in Ogoni, we recognize them, right? When you get to the park, you will see palms dedicated to them.
WALE LAWAL
The execution of the Ogoni 9 was politically motivated. And from the stories of the Ogoni 8 it is even more evident that the Abacha regime and agents such as Lieutenant Colonel Komo, his right hand man Major Okuntimo and the RSIS operation, sought to make examples of these men to terrify the broader Ogoni and Nigerian society. But these eight men were not the only direct victims of the Abacha regime’s brutality; till date their families live with a legacy of grief and injustice. And yet we find that these families have kept a continued drive to vindicate the Ogoni 9 by exposing Shell, the Nigerian government and the truth behind the executions. The message of the Ogoni 9 continues to survive.
WALE LAWAL
So how did Nigerians and the world react to the execution of the Ogoni 9?
Next week on The Republic, we reconnect with Nigeria in 1995 and listen as Abacha oversees his regime’s most brutal act of ethnic repression.
Thanks to Aderemi Ojo, Ibrahim Odugbemi and Peace Onafuye for the archival audio you heard on this episode and our overall research.
You’ll find a full list of the books, articles, and documentaries that we relied on in researching this episode at our website, republic.com.ng/podcasts.
The Republic Podcast is produced by The Republic, a digital media startup based in Lagos, Nigeria; with technical sound engineering by the Voix Collective. The artwork for the show is by Sarah Kanu with graphic design by Dami Mojid and Wale Lawal. Our script writers are Funbi Akinsanya, Tony Malik and myself, Wale Lawal⎈
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