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

Chapter III: Contending Issues in Governance and Democracy at the Local
Government Level in Nigeria: Some Reflections on the Niger Delta Question
structure on the nature of Nigerian federalism. Since it is federalism
that created the need for revenue allocation, it is appropriate to worry
about what a revenue allocation system does to a nation. Take for
example, the recent clamour, court cases and political tension
generated over resource control mounted by the South/South
Governors of oil producing states of Nigeria. The oil producing states
are laying claim to natural resources located both onshore and
offshore which the sharing formulae have wholly allocated to the
central government. This, critics have argued have broken faith with
the letters of true federalism. By the principles of derivation, owners of
resources must have a fair share and say over resources abounding in
their territories. Igun (2008) captured it succinctly when he said “in
the years immediately following independence when Nigeria relied
mainly on cash crops such as groundnuts and cotton (for the North),
cocoa (for the west), and palm oil (for the east), the allocation was one
hundred percent to the generating region”. But this situation changed
considerably when earnings from crude oil became massive and thus
over-took earings from agricultural products. According to Igun, ‘the
ruling elite from the three dominant group connived, using the levers
of federal political power to alter the formula to favour them and deny
the indigenes of the Niger-Delta oil bearing communities’. The Niger-
Delta which is the centre of Nigeria’s multi-billion dollar oil industry is
one of west Africa’s most underdeveloped and violent regions. Though
the region is the source of more than 90% of Nigeria’s foreign
74