KEN SOROWIWA’S AMAZING TRIUMPH FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE!

I shed tears of joy, when I heard that the mighty Royal Dutch Shell, which for decades had gotten away with environmental pollution of apocalyptic proportions in Ogoniland and the rest of the Niger Delta, had finally more or less acknowledged in a US federal court in New York, that the brilliant Nigerian writer, the late Ken Sorowiwa, did indeed have a point about its shameful perfidy in Nigeria. A friend, who always says: “May General Sani Abacha’s soul roast in the hottest part of hell!” whenever I mention the late Nigerian dictator and African kleptocrat-extraordianire’s name, in a roll-call of the most brutal of our continent’s long line of military despots, called me to tell me the good news that Royal Dutch Shell had agreed an out of court settlement and would be compensating the families of Ken Soriwiwa, and the families of the others he was hanged with, as well as the people of Ogoniland with some US$15 millions. We must thank God for such little “humanitarian” (the word used by a Royal Dutch Shell spokesperson to point out they did not accept any culpability) mercies one guesses – as Royal Dutch Shell could have strung the process out till eternity.

The ruling by the US federal law court that means in principle that American companies can indeed be sued in the US law courts, by foreign entities and individuals, for matters arising from the consequences of their overseas operations, is a huge boost for all pan-Africanists who want to fight the massive corruption one finds in many places in Africa, and which is fueled by the complicity of the foreign carpetbaggers, who come to our continent to buy the crooks amongst our leaders. Pan-Africanists have prayed for years, that an equitable way is found to enable us successfully fight the many foreign rogues, who come to Africa to exploit our continent and its people, in their own home countries. Such companies, like the defunct Canadian surface gold mining company Bonte Mines did in the village of Bonte, leave a horrifying trail of misery in their wake, as they repatriate their ill-gotten wealth back home – where they would never dream of putting up for even one second with environmental destruction on the scale they are able to get away with here: because our leaders are too ignorant to understand that in the long-term, we are better off leaving the gold in the ground, because we will eventually spend all the wealth we create in future (from our oil and natural gas revenues), to ameliorate the damage we are busy causing to the natural environment, today.

Who in Ghana that cares about our country and ordinary Ghanaians, is not scandalized by the gross human rights abuses committed by surface gold mining companies that are brutally gang-raping mother Ghana (abuses which are incredibly condoned by the stooges for neo-colonialism amongst our rulers, who billet troops in mining towns to oppress poor rural folk complaining about predatory surface gold mining companies, polluting the natural environment in vast swathes of the Ghanaian countryside), simply because our corrupt leaders have over the years been beholden to mining companies with deep pockets? Future generations of brilliant, young, gifted, and environmentally-aware Africans, will always remember Ken Sorowiwa’s amazing triumph from beyond the grave over a powerful multinational, which still actively participates in the brutal gang-rape of the Niger Delta area in Nigeria, and shamefully continues to contribute to global warming, because it, like its co-conspirators against Nigeria’s Ogoniland people, still flare natural gas and pollute their homeland with impunity.

Naturally, not investing in the necessary infrastructure to harness the natural gas they flare, in order to protect the natural environment, makes perfect sense economically for the oil companies, simply because it adds to their fat bottom-lines. We all look forward to the day, when environmental degradation by foreign companies in the continent, will be a thing of the very distant past – and pan-Africanists across the continent will be able to reminisce (in celebrating a continent finally free of environmental polluters), that once upon a time, during the dark days in Africa, the homeland of our ancestors was awash with ruthless and predatory foreign companies, which were able to destroy much of Africa’s then largely-pristine natural environment, and cruelly exploit the citizens of nations across the continent with total impunity, because they were able to buy corrupt African leaders, who ruled during that dreadful era in our common history. Pan-Africanists the continent over salute the memory of Ken Sorowiwa and his gallant comrades – who died fighting a brutal dictatorship allied with ruthless multinationals (that collaborated to oppress the people of Ogoniland and other Niger Delta communities), and whose fighting spirit was able to triumph in the end, even from beyond the sacred ground they are interred!