An Exxon Valdez sized oil spill has occurred on average every year for the past 50 years in the Niger Delta. Exxon is responsible for 6 spills in the same area of the Niger Delta since December 2009.
If you didn’t already know, Nigeria is renowned for its film scene. Every Thursday in February, the Smithsonian features Nigerian movies as part of the Nollywood Film Festival.
Chevron is a key sponsor of the event. Chevron’s track record inNigeria of human rights and environmental abuse makes it a bad choice for a sponsor.
When JINN phoned the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art Corporate Membership office to express concern about Chevron’s sponsoring of the event and to ask about the criteria for evaluating prospective sponsors, the Smithsonian replied that it could not divulge its criteria; that they are aware of Chevron’s track record inNigeria, but that they did not concern themselves with the political ramifications of what their funders do, since the Smithsonian’s objective is to fund art.
JINN, Rainforest Action Network (RAN), and Global Exhange created a postcard (see photos above and below). At each Thursday event, RAN will distribute, collect, and deliver postcards to the Smithsonian.
If you are in DC–or know people in DC–JINN encourages you to attend the festival to support Nigerian filmmakers, but be sure to let the Smithsonian know that you disapprove of Chevron as the sponsor for this event.
Council Urges U.S. to Pass Transparency Law To Force Chevron and Other Oil Companies to Report Payments to Nigeria and Other Foreign Governments
Mayor Gayle McLaughlin
Richmond, CA – On Tuesday December 15, 2009, the Richmond City Council voted unanimously in favor of a resolution urging the U.S. Senate to pass a bill that would require oil companies to disclose payments to foreign governments as part of a larger movement to increase corporate accountability across borders. Councilmember Nathaniel Bates was absent. A similar resolution was unanimously approved by the Oakland City Council and with one abstention in the Berkeley City Council in October.
The Energy Security Through Transparency Act (ESTT) Act was introduced by Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) in September and if passed would effect oil companies in Nigeria as well as the rest of the world.
“Here in Richmond, we see the links between human rights and corporate accountability issues in our city as the same struggle as those that are demanding a right to their livelihood in Nigeria. Oil companies need to take responsibility where ever oil in produced and refined,” stated Richmond resident Jovanka Beckles who spoke at the meeting.
The Richmond resolution also calls on the State Department to support diplomatic peace talks in the Delta to negotiate a way forward to address the root causes of the current crisis—environmental destruction – particularly gas flaring – and lack of investment in the oil producing region. The city’s call contrasts with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s pledge in August to explore further U.S. military assistance to the government of Nigeria. The resolution along with the passage of the resolution in Oakland and Berkeley marks a new level of support to pressure the United States to adopt a foreign policy that promotes constructive change through dialog in alignment with the American values of democratic civic engagement, and freedom of speech and the press.
In this week’s East Bay Express, reporter Peter Asmus outlines the coordinated efforts of several organizations working together to expose Chevron’s human rights abuses and environmental injustices. JINN is one of several organizations featured.
The Case Against Chevron
An unprecedented campaign by at least a dozen nonprofit groups targets the oil company’s global operations and reputation.
Correction posted on the East Bay Express website by JINN Founder regarding her quotes in the Nigeria section of the article below:
JINN wants to thank the East Bay Express and journalist Peter Asmus for thoughtful and detailed coverage of “The Case Against Chevron,” which describes the strength of the coalition that is demanding the company act responsibly with regard to its past liabilities and current operations. I need to offer a few corrections: Justice in Nigeria Now (JINN), the organization I founded and volunteer with may do the work of a larger organization, but it presently is staffed by one Coordinator. The sentence attributed to me stating that “military rogues” blew up the oil facilities is not an accurate quote. In fact, it was armed political militants who took this action in response to military attacks on civilians living in villages near Chevron’s facility in Warri. According to these political militants, they were motivated to substantially shut down oil production because the military attacks injured, killed and displaced villagers who were innocent civilians. The situation in the Delta is complex. It is important to note that for the first 50 years of oil extraction the strongest message by villagers trying to survive in their own communities consisted of non violent protest. Civil disobedience was aimed at oil companies by villagers whose self sufficient lifestyle was destroyed by oil operations that polluted and salinized their water, decimating the fish they ate and ruining their livelihood. Over the last few years, an armed militancy developed in the region. Nonetheless, the large majority of the Delta’s estimated 20 million residents continue to act and live peacefully and nonviolently. To this day, many villagers demonstrate in the spirit of Martin Luther King or Ken Saro Wiwa armed only with placards and songs. At the same time, there is also a set of armed militant groups with political demands who witnessed the suppression of peaceful protests by military might sometimes at the behest of oil companies (who have admitted flying the notoriously brutal Nigerian military to the site of a sit in and paying the Nigerian military field allowances.) The political militants demand the development of the Delta by reinvesting some of the massive $700 billion in profits that Big Oil and the Nigerian government have reaped back into local communities who seek to survive on the land from which this money was extracted. Their demands include jobs, electrification, clean water, and education. When pondering the relatively new development of the armed militancy, one must be take into account that interrupting oil production garners the attention of the international media, the U.S. government, the Nigerian government and even U.S. consumers concerned about prices at the pump. This attention is something that peaceful protesters were unable to muster. All of us who use gas are complicit in the circumstances that make militancy seem attractive. While there are actors employing a range of tactics it is important not to confuse peaceful villagers and armed militant groups, even when they make the same demands. I’m afraid at times Mr. Asmus’ article fails to make that distinction. Laura Livoti Founder Justice In Nigeria Now
The oil industry is more powerful today than at any other time in history save the early 20th century. Thanks to last year’s record run-up in oil prices, seven of the world’s most valuable corporations are now oil companies. Yet just one of those companies has become the focus of intense consumer ire.
Perhaps the largest coordinated activist campaign in history is being launched against the San Ramon-based Chevron Corporation. Foregoing boycotts and other traditional market campaign techniques, non-governmental organizations are creatively communicating the business case for why Chevron should change its ways, focusing on mobilizing company shareholders and consumers to compel the company to come clean and pursue social and environmental leadership.
This unprecedented campaign to make Chevron the poster child of corporate irresponsibility has already persuaded pension funds in California, Maryland, New York, and Pennsylvania to consider selling a total of $12 billion in Chevron shares on the grounds that the firm is mismanaging its operations around the globe. The prime focus of this ongoing anti-Chevron effort has been the company’s annual shareholder meetings, but protests at the Richmond refinery and a series of movie and PR stunts have been also been effective tactics….Read full article
Nigeria Section of article:
Nigeria may represent Chevron’s toughest challenge yet. What happens in Nigeria could have major impacts on future operations in a continent destined to become the top oil producer for the United States in the coming decades. In fact, Africa already supplies the United States with more oil than the Middle East.
Nigeria’s population of 150 million people makes it the most populous country in Africa. The country is torn by cultural and religious strife. The north is predominately Muslim and has traditionally dominated governing structures. The south is comprised primarily of poor Christian populations living near the oil reserves in the Niger Delta, a former fishing community. These southerners traditionally have not had much voice in governmental affairs.
Oil operations have decimated fish populations, interrupting the traditional way of life in the Niger Delta. Many villagers write long detailed letters to Chevron about the impacts oil operations have on their lives — but they never get a response. Chevron employees live in barricades so they have no interaction with the local population. As of late, villagers have become armed and steal oil — locals call it “bunkering” — and Chevron has begun to bribe armed rebels to allow oil to get to market, further entrenching a culture of corruption in Nigeria.
“Oil is so lucrative that a web of mysterious relationships between oil companies, the government, militants, and communities has evolved,” said Laura Livoti, founder of Justice in Nigeria Now, and a longtime activist and radio reporter. Without her group, the issues surrounding oil and this troubled African country would never make the news and become part of the ongoing dialogue about how to reform Chevron and other oil companies operating there. The media tends to ignore what happens in this part of the world, but Livoti’s group, with a staff of two, is determined to change that.
Earlier this year, for example, 20,000 villagers were displaced during a government-backed crackdown funded by Chevron. “No humanitarian aid was allowed, no journalists, no human-rights observers. Military rogues blew up facilities, which shut down the oil industry. Things got so bad, Chevron pulled out all non-essential employees,” Livoti said.
It was this development that prompted the government to offer an amnesty program for militants this past May. While many balked, a large number have come forward to accept amnesty, except the militants most committed to political ideals as well as genuine solutions to local poverty.
The militants and ongoing corruption in Nigeria complicates things. “When the Nigerians were peaceful protestors, it was a lot easier to gain sympathy,” acknowledged Livoti. “Now that an armed resistance as risen up in Nigeria, attracting sympathy — and financial support — is much more difficult,” she said. Read Full article
Berkeley City Council last night approved a resolution urging the U.S. Senate to approve S.1700, the “Energy Security Through Transparency Act” by U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., which would urge the Obama Administration to require that companies disclose payments to foreign governments for oil, gas and mineral rights. Oakland City Council passed a similar resolution last week.
“Good governance in extractive industries contribute to a better domestic investment climate for U.S. businesses, increase the reliability of commodity supplies, promote greater U.S. energy security and thereby strengthen our national security,” says the summary on Lugar’s Web site.
San Francisco-based Justice in Nigeria Now hails the cities’ actions as a moral victory.
“I was tortured and imprisoned by the Nigerian military for my peaceful protests against Shell Oil’s destruction of our land,” Suanu Kingston Bere, a Nigerian activist who spoke at the Berkeley City Council meeting, said in JINN’s news release. “I believe the City’s support sends a strong message that communities in the U.S are concerned about the human rights abuses and environmental damage associated with oil extraction. I do not want to see my people continue to go through what I went through.”
Berkeley’s resolution also calls on the State Department to support third-party peace talks in the Delta to address environmental destruction and lack of investment in the oil producing region. The resolution was co-sponsored by Councilmembers Jesse Arreguin, Darryl Moore and Max Anderson and was introduced to the council through the Berkeley Peace and Justice Commission, which worked with JINN to draft it.
JINN says 50 years of oil exploitation in the Niger Delta has produced over $700 billion in oil revenues shared between the Nigerian government and oil giants like San Ramon-based Chevron as well as Exxon Mobil and Shell. More than 40 percent of Nigeria’s oil is exported to the U.S. Yet despite the corporate oil wealth, local residents’ quality of life has deteriorated – their drinking polluted, their food fisheries poisoned, their access to education, health care and even electricity limited.
“Oil companies in Nigeria have had long a relationship with the notoriously corrupt and historically brutal Nigerian government where rampant corruption, fraudulent elections and violent suppression of peaceful protests are the norm in the Delta,” Nigerian writer and activist Omoyele Sowore said in JINN’s news release. “The proposed ESTT Act in the Senate is an important step toward holding oil companies accountable for their collusion with the Nigerian government, which protects their profits while killing and injuring innocent local people and destroying the Delta’s fragile environment.”
Sweet Crude Playing at United Nations Film Festival – SF screening, Free Admission
Sunday, October 18, 2009 at 2:50pm
San Francisco, Variety Screening Room
582 Market Street, San Francisco -Map
Sweet Crude, is playing for FREE on Sunday October 18th in San Francisco as part of the United Nations Film Festival. The award winning documentary captures the complex reality of how the oil industry and the Nigerian government have left the Delta in such desperation that some have turned to militancy while others struggle to survive. The film will be followed by a panel discussion with the Director and experts and activists focused on the issues in the Niger Delta.
Stay for the panel discussion with film’s Director Sandy Cioffi, Nigerian activist Suanu Bere, Professor Michael Watts who is featured in the film and Daniel Volman, Director of the African Security Research Project.
This film gives one of the best historical contexts to the current conflict in the Niger Delta, where oil companies and the Nigerian government have left the region in abject poverty, created major environmental disasters and a history of human rights abuses.
“Good characters make good docs, and Cioffi is fortunate to have thoughtful men and funny, feisty women (and sometimes vice versa) to ornament a film that provides enough history to make sense and enough humanity to wash it down. Despite the utter destruction of their environment and the fact that mothers now have to describe to their children the animals that once ran free around their homes, a sense of despondency and/or resignation is absent from what Cioffi presents. There are plenty of reasons for dread; the speed with which the air quality rots the zinc roofs of the houses makes one shudder to think what it’s doing to the inhabitants. But the mood is generally upbeat and optimistic, despite anyone’s prognosis”
Climate Activists Say Chevron and Other Climate Polluters Have No Business Dictating Climate Policy
San Francisco, CA – A broad coalition of organizations from up and down the west coast arrived in force today to deliver a strong message to US lawmakers and polluting corporations that are decimating our prospects of meaningful climate solutions.
The protest rally started at 11:00am today at the San Francisco office of Senator Barbara Boxer (1700 Montgomery St., SF), chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee that will be presenting a Climate and Energy Bill currently in Congress by the end of the week.
“If Congress wants to protect the public interest, they would never consider adopting the current climate bill (the American Clean Energy & Security Act) that was written by big oil and energy corporations in the first place”, said Carla Pérez of the Movement Generation Justice & Ecology project, “Cap and Trade legislation coupled with direct subsidies to oil, coal, nuclear, bio-fuels and incinerator industries will only serve to add hundreds of toxic smokestacks in our backyards.” Read the rest of this entry »
Richmond, CA – Hundreds of Richmond community members joined climate change advocates, public health experts, local government and labor leaders today in a colorful march, protest and non-violent civil disobedience at Chevron’s Richmond refinery. After a festival outside the Richmond BART station with music, dancers and speakers, and an hour-long march that wound through the city streets, a mass die-in and nonviolent civil disobedience took place at the refinery gates. Thirteen people were arrested.
The actions outside Chevron were organized by a new coalition–The Mobilization for Climate Justice-West–whose goals are to get Chevron to “cap the crude” at its Richmond refinery and to get al l corporations, including Chevron, out of the international climate talks in Copenhagen in December. Chevron wants to process heavier crude at its Richmond refinery. Refining heavier crude will result in more air pollution, greater greenhouse gas emissions and disease.
“Chevron has the opportunity to do the right thing,” said Mayor of Richmond, Gayle McLaughlin. “They just need to agree to capping the crude at the level they currently refine. We want them to put Richmond’s residents to work modernizing and replacing the 80 year old boilers, which sadly they chose to remove from the project several months ago. ” “We want Chevron to build a cleaner and safer refinery,” said Ana Orozco of Communities for A Better Environment. ”We want the union jobs to continue to build a refinery that is cleaner and safer for our community. Our community has been put at risk for too long.”
When Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meets with Nigerian President Umaru Yar’Adua on Wednesday August 12, she will discuss what JINN thinks are some of the most important and interconnected issues facing the country today: electoral integrity, corruption and the Niger Delta. We hope she sends a strong message that reform in all three areas is necessary for Nigeria to continue functioning as a State and to continue as a key U.S. ally.
Nigeria is known for its fraudulent elections and politicians who employ armed thugs to ensure votes are cast in their favor. The Nigerian government faces a crisis of credibility that has the potential to become volatile, if members of minority communities and residents of the politically disenfranchised economic engine of the Delta continue to feel that they do not have any real power or say in their own governance. In fact, the armed insurgency that gained world attention by disrupting oil operations in the Delta has its roots in the gangs armed by political candidates. Electoral integrity and the ability for all citizens of Nigeria’s democracy to participate meaningfully should be high on Secretary Clinton’s agenda.
Legendary for its high levels of corruption, Nigeria must institute real reform. For those living in the Niger Delta, corruption means that the majority live in poverty while the approximately $700 billion in oil revenues earned over the last fifty years was split between the Nigerian government and the oil companies, with which the government partners. Although the Nigerian government claims to send a small percentage of its oil revenues to the communities where it is extracted, and although oil companies claim to provide local community benefits, the majority of those living in the Delta’s oil producing communities live on less than $1 per day and have seen their living standards decline over the years. Secretary Clinton must insist that the Nigerian government institute measures to ensure greater transparency and accountability, which are critical to ensuring that the country’s revenues benefit the many and don’t just line the pockets of a few. Ultimately, U.S. businesses will also find it easier to operate in a less corrupt environment.
The Niger Delta and its oil resources fuel the Nigerian treasury, which depends upon oil for 80% of government revenue. The oil of the Delta is important to both countries. In 2006 more then 40% of Nigeria’s oil was exported to the U.S. and it represented 15% of the U.S. supply. However, a political militancy has reduced Nigerian output for the last few years. Output has been even more dramatically reduced since May of this year when militants began blowing up oil installations in reprisal for an ongoing series of attacks by the Nigerian military claiming to be rooting out militants, but destroyed local villages and displaced, killed and injured innocent civilians who still cannot return home. The political militancy of the last five years arose after 45 years of peaceful protest by villagers yielded no major improvements for local communities whose quality of life was decimated. When Secretary Clinton meets with President Yar’Adua it is imperative to U.S. economic and energy security, to the stability of Nigeria and to the lives of those who live in the Delta that she urge President Umaru Yar’Adua to:
Withdraw the Nigerian military forces from the Niger Delta and institute an official ceasefire;
Initiate third party monitored diplomatic talks that include all stakeholders;
Allow free and unfettered access to all parts of the Delta by journalists, humanitarian aid groups and human rights organizations;
Make real investments in the development of the Niger Delta and rebuild villages destroyed by the recent military attacks.
Electoral integrity, transparency and accountability and addressing the root cause of the troubles in the Niger Delta are interconnected issues that we applaud the Obama administration for publicly stating are on its agenda. JINN hopes that in her discussions regarding the Niger Delta that Secretary Clinton recognizes the imperative of seeking long term solutions that will meet the real needs of villagers in oil producing communities while once again increasing production output and oil revenues.
Behind fighter-planes and gunboats, Nigerian forces launched a full-scale offensive in the Niger Delta on May 13, displacing 30,000 people and sparking a humanitarian crisis. Thousands of civilians fleeing destroyed villages are now trapped between armed resistance groups and the Nigerian military. These civilians are hiding in the bush without food, water, or medical supplies, let alone Internet access to alert the world of their plight, as Iranians are doing via Twitter.
Suanu Bere speaking at a Shell rally in San Francisco. Credit: Jan Stürmann
Against the backdrop of a world energy crisis, the media are reporting the region’s growing instability, mostly in terms of its effect on global oil supply and prices. For the 12 million people living in the Niger Delta, however, the struggle is about their survival.
Nigeria: Petroleum, Pollution and Poverty in the Niger Delta
On Tuesday June 30, Amnesty International released a major report detailing the the pollution and environmental damage caused by the oil companies while the Nigerian government continues to favor the oil companies and not the people of the Niger Delta.
“Oil companies have been exploiting Nigeria’s weak regulatory system for too long,” said Audrey Gaughran of Amnesty International. “They do not adequately prevent environmental damage and they frequently fail to properly address the devastating impact that their bad practice has on people’s lives.”
This 143-page report covers explains how decades of neglect, human rights abuses and environmental damage has contributed to the current crisis in the Niger Delta.
