Word: nigeria
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...addition to being a vocal environmentalist, Saro-Wiwa was an accomplished poet, playwright, publisher and father of four. As a young person, Saro-Wiwa experienced and wrote about the horror of Nigeria's civil wars and tribal conflicts, leading him to advocate nonviolent protest against the military junta...
...intransigence of Nigeria's military leaders towards global opinion is not surprising. General Sani Abacha, Nigeria's dictator, and other military leaders have profited enormously from oil revenues reaped by Shell's exploitation of Saro-Wiwa's homeland and other parts of the country. To ensure continued profits from the oil industry, the military government of Nigeria instituted a crackdown resulting in the deaths of over 2,000 of Saro-Wiwa's tribes people. In 1993, during the transition from military to civil government, Abacha imprisoned Chief Moshood Abiola, the democratically chosen president, declaring the election invalid...
Although Shell's chief executive did send a personal to Nigeria's leaders to spare Sao-Wiwa's life, it was clearly a token gesture. As long as companies such as Shell continue to support the military junta by mining Nigerian oil, and, as long as institutions like Harvard invest in Shell, human rights abuses such as Saro-Wiwa's unjust execution will continue...
After the hangings, the World Bank canceled a $100 million loan to Nigeria. Supporters of Saro-Wiwa are calling for a boycott of Nigerian oil, half of which is exported to the United States. Harvard should join the rest of the world in giving Nigeria's military leaders a clear financial incentive to respect human rights...
Leading the student movement is Hafsat D. Abiola '96, daughter of the imprisoned Nigerian president-elect. Last week, Abiola convinced the Undergraduate Council to pass a resolution asking the Board of Overseers to divest from oil companies investing in Nigeria...