Contending Issues in the Niger Delta Crisis of Nigeria - Journal of ...

Dr. Esekumemu V. Clark
reconstructed the Fourth Republic under the democratically elected
civilian administration of President Obasanjo.
Thus from all these indications, one can ascertain that the
failure of the political system has been the inability of the political
elite to follow through on the principles of the liberal democracy which
were strongly entrenched in the Willink Commission of 1958. Among
others, the power elite fails to recognise and redress the concerns of
ethnic minorities raised in the Willink Commission preceding
independence. The ruling elite also failed in contributing to poverty
reduction despite the enormous oil revenues made from the 1970s.
Such concerns had led to restiveness among the Nigerian population.
In the 1960s, for example, the Ijaws sounded the alarm over the
issues of development, environmental degradation and political
representation. But both of the then regional and central
governments had failed to pay fuller attention to their concerns,
despite the pollution of their land from oil exploration and exploitation
as well as oil revenue, which was not fairly used to develop the Niger
Delta to ease their situation. Hence, the failure of the Nigerian
authorities to take appropriate steps to tackle these problems led in
1966 to Ijaw Youth’s revolt led by the late Isaac Adaka Boro.
The “Ijaw question” has become an intricate issue for past
Nigerian leaders, including the current President Obasanjo, over the
reconstitution of oil resources, i.e. wealth and power shifting to Ijaws
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