POET KEN SARO-WIWA

'The flames of Shell are flames of Hell,
We bask below their light,
Nought for us to serve the blight,
Of cursed neglect and cursed Shell.'
– Ogoni Song[/URL]

Poet Ken Saro-Wiwa (1941-1995) courtesy wazobaa

Poet Kenule Beeson Tsaro-Wiwa aka Ken Saro-Wiwa was a playwright, writer, TV producer and Human Rights activist. Today (10 November, 2008) will mark the 13th anniversary of the execution of “Ogoni Nine”. They were killed for protesting injustice of genocide by oil companies e.g. Shell and Chevron in the Niger Delta, Nigeria.

According to Bart Mongoven, 'Saro-Wiwa was arrested after a protest in May 1994 and detained for a year alongside several other Ogoni leaders. He was tried and sentenced to death with eight other activists (together, they are known as the "Ogoni Nine") on Oct. 31, 1995, and hanged 10 days later — despite the objections of world leaders, including U.S. President Bill Clinton, and the unanimous condemnation of Commonwealth states. Human rights and environmental organizations around the world joined in the condemnation of the killing, and many demanded to know what Shell had done to pressure the Abacha regime against moving ahead with the execution'.

Dis Nigeria Sef

Oder people dey speak one language
Your own come pass two hundred:
Sanu, ekaro, deeyira, tank you, doo
kakifo, nonsense, you no go fit take one!
Nigeria, you too like borrow borrow
You borrow money, cloth you dey borrow
You borrow motor, you borrow aeroplane
You borrow chop, you borrow drink
Sotey you borrow anoder man language
Begin confuse am with your confusion
Anytin you borrow you go confuse am to nonsense
Idiot debtor, wetin you go do
When de owners go come take dem tings?

Ken Saro-Wiwa
(From Songs in a Time of War, 1985)