APCJ_1528_Win2010_00i_122_4 12/30/10 3:22 PM Page 39 Oil, Politics, and Conflict in the Niger Delta 39 tion and access to farmland. Laws that alienate communities from their land structurally embed killing features, which can lead to social, economic, environmental, political, and cultural conditions of marginality. Ample evidence of those effects abound in the literature on the oil-related conflict in the Niger Delta. National ownership of Nigeria’s oil and the nature of governance over it, in which only federal political institutions play a significant role, has put at risk any previously existing harmonious relationships between the government and oil companies on one side and local justice and environmental groups on the other. The sense of injustice among the latter groups is an outcome of the mode of governance used to manage the resource. Exacerbating the conditions in these communities is the lack of development among them, evident in the absence of potable drinking water, hospitals, schools, roads, and electricity in spite of the huge revenues that have accrued to the Nigerian state during five decades of oil production. The government’s negligence in enforcing relevant oil-related environmental laws meant to achieve sustainable development manifested itself in the poor compliance attitude of oil companies, whose corporate social responsibilities in theory entail respect for the environment and participation in the development of the communities where they operate. The Environmental Impact Assessment Act of 1992 demands government enforcement of compliance by the oil sector. The law has not been followed, which is why local communities have on their own initiative resisted damage to their environment by the oil companies while also insisting on responsible governance of the environment and development of their region. The response of the Nigerian state has been a mixture of force and nonviolent strategies. The use of security personnel to violently quell resistance against oil companies has been one approach. A soldier interviewed simply stated, ‘We are trained to kill, and that is our mission in the Niger Delta’.27 In another example, government security personnel responded violently to peaceful protests by the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People, killing some of its members in 1994.28 Nine MOSOP leaders, including its spokesman and founder, Saro-Wiwa, were tried and executed by the military government under Gen. Sani Abacha for the deaths of four prominent Ogoni men at the hands of Ogoni youths in 1994.29 Violence has not only begotten violence in the Niger Delta, but has also influenced the emergence of a culture with serious implications because of its devaluation of life. The transition from military rule to democracy in 1999 did not alter the character of the Nigerian state in respect to its use of force. The Joint Military Task Force, constituted and deployed by the government to the delta to protect oil company facilities and dismantle resistance against the state and the corporations, has engaged innocent and sometimes unarmed local civilian populations protesting corporate activities and the lack of regional development. The experience of Odi in Bayelsa state is a prime example. President Olusegun Obasanjo had sent the military into the area on 20 27. Interview, soldier (name withheld) with the Joint Military Task Force, University of Port Harcourt, 4 June 2010. 28 See for example, Okey Ibeanu and Robin Luckham, Niger Delta: Political Violence, Governance and Corporate Responsibility in a Petro-State (Abuja, Centre for Democracy and Development, 2006), 48. Also see Allen, ‘Implementation of oil-related environmental policy’, 93. 29. The four were killed on 21 May 1994 by youths who felt betrayed by their speaking in favour and support of the government and oil companies.