Rumblings of renewed militancy continue in Bayelsa, Nigeria
The violence seen in the lead-up to the gubernatorial election could be just the beginning of trouble in the Niger Delta, says guest blogger Alex Thurston.
The violence seen in the lead-up to the gubernatorial election could be just the beginning of trouble in the Niger Delta, says guest blogger Alex Thurston.
鈥� A version of this post ran on the author's blog, www.sahelblog.wordpress.com. The views expressed are the author's own.
Few were surprised to see that Nigeria鈥檚 ruling party, the People鈥檚 Democratic Party (PDP), won Saturday鈥檚 gubernatorial election in Bayelsa State. The PDP controls not only the presidency but also a super-majority of the nation鈥檚 governorships, and it has dominated Bayelsa politics since Nigeria鈥檚 Fourth Republic began in 1999. The victor in Bayelsa,聽Henry Seriake Dickson, had the strong support of President Goodluck Jonathan.
As mentioned in a post last week, Bayelsa, which lies in the Niger Delta, has faced not only political tension but also renewed violence. Some of this violence is electoral, some targets the oil industry, and all of it is in some sense or another political. The election is now over, 聽but that does not settle questions about where the politics of the region are headed.
For one thing, there are signs of discontent with the electoral process. Turnout was low, reports Leadership. Minor clashes have occurred between rival partisans, reports All Africa. And the deposed former governor of Bayelsa State, Timipre Sylva, is still awaiting a court date in April to determine whether or not he was unfairly prevented from running in this election, reports Business Day. Somehow I doubt that Sylva will win the legal victory he seeks 鈥� but the wait for the hearing means that in some ways the election is not completely over, a feeling that could cast something of a shadow over the first two months of Dickson鈥檚 tenure.
More important still are the rumblings concerning the possibility of renewed militancy in the Delta. Fears focus in particular on the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), whose attacks disrupted oil production in the region before some militants agreed to an amnesty deal with the Federal Government in 2009. MEND has claimed a recent pipeline attack as a well as the bombing of the home of the聽Minister of Niger-Delta, Elder Peter Godsday Orubebe.
According to MEND鈥檚 recent statements, the fresh attacks have come about for a number of reasons, including the alleged incompetence of President Jonathan, the alleged corruption of the government, and what MEND sees as the misguided use of amnesty funds. One of MEND鈥檚 communications reads in part, 鈥淩ather than address serious issues facing the nation and its citizens, Goodluck Jonathan squanders public funds on tribalistic sycophants and thugs calling themselves ex-militants.鈥�
The discontent surrounding the question of who has benefited from the amnesty and who has not is critical. One analysis of the potential for renewed violence in the Delta elaborates:
The whole piece is worth reading. If this diagnosis is correct 鈥� namely, that there exists a class of former footsoldiers who received little or no benefit from the amnesty, and are angry enough over their exclusion to contemplate picking up weapons again 鈥� the violence seen in the lead-up to the gubernatorial election in Bayelsa could be just the beginning of another round of problems for the Delta.
鈥� Alex Thurston is a PhD student studying Islam in Africa at Northwestern University and blogs at Sahel Blog.
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