The endless search for solution to the Niger Delta Dilemma re-echoed penultimate week at the 2009 Claude Ake Memorial Lecture organised by the Ogba Solidarity, a social organization of the Ogba ethnic nationality. Apparently, the Conference of Ethnic Nationalities of the Niger Delta (CEND), social organisations, traditional rulers, students, scholars, and leaders of thought from within and outside the country attended the memorial lecture to re-activate their memories of the life and times of Professor Claude Ake who died in the ill-fated ADC plane crash on November 7, 1996.

Professor Claude Ake, an academic purist, will continue to live in the minds of many as one of the most distinguished political-economists of this world. He was a visionary leader and a spokesman for the development of the African continent. He was a humble, courageous, and far-sighted man; a native of Omoko in Ogba/Egema/Ndoni Local Government Area of Rivers State who used his intellectual gift from God to serve his community and the Niger Delta profoundly. Professor Ake wrote many books including A Political Economy of Africa, Theory of Political Integration, Revolutionary Pressures in Africa, and Social Science as Imperialism.

As we commemorate the works of Professor Ake and his selfless service to his Niger Delta people and indeed, the world, we remember others who started the search for solution to the Niger Delta dilemma.

At the Claude Ake Memorial Lecture, the Emeritus Professor of History, University of Port Harcourt, E. J. Alagoa recounted the struggle of some past Niger Delta leaders to liberate the region from oppression and exploitation. In his paper titled The Crisis of Leadership in the Niger Delta, he said: “King William Dappa Pepple of Bonny confronted foreign interests with a resource control agenda and paid the price with exile to Britain in the mid-nineteenth century. King Jaja of Opobo paid a similar price in the 1880s and ended up in the Caribbean. Nana of the Itsekiri and Ibanichuka of Okrika ended up in Calabar and Degema in the 1890s”. According to him it was only King Frederick William Koko of Nembe who destroyed the British trade depot at Akassa in 1895 and succeeded in keeping out of sight, and escaping being captured, detained and exiled. Professor Alagoa further stated: “In contemporary times, struggles have been waged by political leaders such as Harold Dappa Biriye and his associates from virtually every corner of the Niger Delta. Struggles of more radical  type have been led by Adaka Boro and Ken Saro Wiwa, providing immediate models for the critical actions of the militants of our current crisis”.

And even before the youths formed themselves into militant groups brandishing sophisticated arms, kidnapping and killing people, disrupting oil operations and making the entire region ungovernable, the citizens had become disillusioned and fed up with the palliative solutions and lip service approach to their dilemma. Ethnic nationalism was already on the increase. In one way or the other the Ogbas, Ogonis, Ijaws, Ibibios, Urhobos, and the other several ethnic nationalities in the region had continued to assert their rights to the oil resource in their respective areas. Besides, the school leavers, the school teachers, the junior civil servants, the petty traders, and the farmers had become acutely frustrated as it had become difficult for them to Eke out a meaningful living in a region that serves as the engine of growth for the nation.

With several commissions and boards, the lamentable economic and environmental conditions faced by the various communities in the region still continued to degenerate as a result of the mindless activities of the oil companies.

Now inspite of cynicism in some quarters, the federal government appears to be counting its gains in the amnesty deal with the militants. But it is not yet uhuru for the federal government as the ex-militants are protesting all over the place raping women and rubbing people of their valuable property over the alleged non-payment of their allowances. According to media reports, four University of Port Harcourt female students have died after being raped about a week ago by the ex-militants camped at Aluu, near the campus.

Apparently, the search for solution to the Niger Delta quagmire may still continue. But when one tries to assess the socio-economic future of the region and the possibility that the much desired development will be achieved, everything leads to the practice of true federalism. In true federalism, the constitution is organised in such a way that it satisfies the desires and needs of the federating units.

It goes without saying that one of the major desires and needs of the Niger Delta region is that the oil bearing communities be made part owners in the exploitation of their resources.