Introduction

Beverly Naidoo et The Other Side of Truth

Nous sommes en 2008/2009 et madame Bertholle, professeur d’anglais, décide d’étudier ‘The Other Side of Truth’ de Beverley Naidoo avec ses élèves de Terminale L et Terminale ES, œuvre qui figure dans le programme de lecture de l’épreuve d’anglais , langue de complément au baccalauréat général.

Le livre raconte l’histoire de deux enfants dont la mère a été tuée alors que c’est leur père, journaliste opposé au régime dictatorial de Nigéria, qui était visé. Pour protéger ses enfants, le père les envoie en Angleterre, accompagnés d’une passeuse. Celle-ci les abandonne brutalement en pleine gare de Londres. L’aventure en Angleterre commence.

Les élèves ont été séduits par l’histoire et, à Noël, chacun a écrit une lettre à Madame Beverley Naidoo pour lui donner ses impressions sur le livre ou encore pour poser des questions.

Madame Naidoo a répondu.

Une vidéo-conférence a eu lieu en mars 2009, moment magique où l’on découvre l’auteur, où l’on entend sa voix, où l’on peut dialoguer. Les élèves sont impressionnés.

L’œuvre est de nouveau étudiée cette année et Madame Naidoo a accepté de venir chez nous pour quelques jours pour rencontrer les élèves et dans le même temps découvrir la Normandie.

Joseph Minguy, Directeur

Terminales de JBS Rouen

L'établissement

Terminales ES et L, 2011-2012

Terminales ES et L, 2010-2011

Terminales ES et L, 2009-2010

Terminales ES et L, 2008-2009

Beverley Naidoo in "Webcam conversation" at JBS

BEVERLEY NAIDOO IN ‘WEBCAM CONVERSATION’
WITH STUDENTS OF MRS BERTHOLLE

AT LYCÉE J.B. DE LA SALLE, ROUEN, FRANCE - 14 April 2009 -
AFTER THEY HAD READ THE OTHER SIDE OF TRUTH


Noemie
First of all we would like to ask you a few questions about your life because we understand it has influenced your writing. You were brought up in South Africa under Apartheid and how did you find the courage to go against everything you were taught and what did you personally do?

BN: Well, that’s an interesting question. I would say that once I realized what was really happening in South Africa and began to see in a new way everything around me, there was only one of two choices. It’s like suddenly realizing that bullying is going on. You realize that somebody is abusing their power over somebody else. What do you do? If you do nothing, you become part of the problem because you are then part of the context that allows that bullying to continue. I think for me it was a gradual process of beginning to see things differently. My brother had begun to change before me, and I remember very big arguments that I had with him at first, saying he must be a communist and I defended my parents’ conservative views.
But in time I began to have experiences that completely opened my eyes. Those experiences happened when I was at university, not inside the classroom but outside. There were still a few black students at our university although the white government had passed a law to close what they called a ‘white university’ to black students but there were still a few black students remaining there when I arrived. My mother never gave me much pocket money and I am very grateful to her for that because it meant that I had to take sandwiches every day to eat - and that wasn’t very cool. It also meant that I didn’t go into the canteen where most of the white students were, just chatting about this and that, music and parties, whatever. But I went to look for students who were eating sandwiches and I found a group of students on the lawn outside the library. They were white and black students and they were having conversations that blew my mind, conversations about what was happening in the country.
There were contradictions in how I was brought up. I went to a Catholic school where the nuns would tell us how to be good people and to love your neighbour but actually the way ‘neighbour’ was defined didn’t include black South Africans. My father was Church of England and he would sometimes take me to a service on a Sunday. Again, in the pulpit, the priest would talk about loving your neighbour but he never challenged what was happening under Apartheid. And my mother was Jewish – I cried over what had happened to Anne Frank but I never saw what was happening around me! I never made any connections when I was still at school, but within my upbringing there were values that spoke to me about how one should treat other human beings with respect. The problem was how that society defined who was your community - and in South Africa at that time community was being defined for me as a white community. But there were those other values being spoken about, so it was full of contradictions. Once I realized what was happening, it was no use just me saying, “Isn’t that terrible? Isn’t Apartheid terrible?” and doing nothing about it because I knew then that I would continue to be part of the problem. So I had to choose: either I had to be part of it or try to resist it. I’m very glad that I chose the latter.

Gueric

I learned that you were in jail for a couple of weeks and I want to ask you what it was like in jail and, when you were released, if you were scared?

BN: Okay, I was in jail for a short while, it was eight weeks, fifty six days. It was under very bad legislation which we called the ‘Ninety-Days Law’, where you could be locked up without any charge and kept for the ninety days and those ninety days could be renewed. It was solitary confinement. It was an extraordinary learning experience for me. I was locked up just after people like Nelson Mandela, and Walter Sisulu and Denis Goldberg and Ahmed Kathrada – the people we call the Rivonia trialists - had been sent to jail. Jails were segregated in South Africa, so Nelson Mandela and six others went to Robben Island and one man went to the white section of the jail in Pretoria; that was Denis Goldberg. After that the state was then looking to round up people who were lower down [in supporting the resistance]; I was in that group. I was arrested at the same time as a number of other white women and we were first taken into the white women’s section of Pretoria prison. Jail is not, was not, pleasant. It’s not meant to be pleasant, but there was segregation and layers in jail in South Africa, so as a white woman prisoner I didn’t have the experience of a black woman prisoner. I had a bed for instance; it was a hard bed but I had a bed, whereas black women prisoners were given mats on the floor, and very dirty mats at that. The food that was given to white prisoners was different to the food given to black prisoners. In our section I was one of the youngest. There was one younger person than me, Sheila Weinberg. In our section we came to a decision that we would go on a hunger strike until they charged us. We said, ‘If you’ve got something against us, charge us, put us in front of a court - that’s an important principle - but don’t just lock us up without any charges.’ And that, again, was a great learning experience for me because I was learning from the more experienced women.
We couldn’t talk to each other openly, but at night-time, when the warders went away, we would try and speak over the wired netting above our cells. So there was a certain amount of communication, secret communication, but after ten days they separated us to break the hunger strike and I was then sent to a prison in a place called Krugersdorp and, as far as I know, I was the only white, woman prisoner there at the time. I was on the ground floor and I could look out of my window and see the many black women prisoners. Some were very, very young and they had babies on their backs and I could see the way the warders would scream at them. I wasn’t allowed to clean my cell; a black, woman prisoner was made to come in and clean that cell. So you can see that even in prisons the whole system of discrimination was built into it. When I was released, most of the others were charged. The youngest detainee, Sheila Weinberg, was also released. They had something on us, but we were like little fish so they let us go while they charged the others, including my brother.
Although my mother didn’t accept the way I saw things, she was very good, because on that first day out I was very disoriented and she said, “You’re coming to see a play with me.” I said, “I don’t feel like it”. She said, “No, it’s very important that you come.” She was really telling me, “Don’t let them get you down, don’t let this break you,” even though she didn’t agree with our views. I went to the play with her and I remember sitting at this play by Shakespeare in an outdoor theatre - with the stage on a small island in the middle of the Zoo Lake in Johannesburg - and I remember the tears streaming down my face because I was thinking about the people I had left behind while I was watching this play outside. It was bizarre.
Was I scared? Yes, it was scary but while I was inside, I think I was more scared that I might break down and that I would then begin to talk. I wanted to stay very strong, and just say, “Well, if you’ve got something against me, charge me.” I did not want to co-operate with them, the Special Branch police. And they used torture on some of the others. They started using torture on white political prisoners around that time. I mean they used torture all the time on black prisoners and when the interrogators came and showed me a statement my brother had made mentioning me, I knew that they must have tortured him. I knew that he would have been like a rock and that to get him to speak it would have involved torture. It turned out they had used the standing torture. They had made him stand on one place, without moving; I think it was something like 69 or 70 hours and then they had given him a break, and then he’d stood again and after about 44 hours he then cracked and had written this statement. My husband too who was in jail - although I didn’t know him then - he also experienced the standing torture at that time. They also had many other terrible methods. So it was a test, I suppose, for me about what’s really important. I can only say that I was very grateful that they didn’t put physical pressure on me because I don’t know how I would have stood up to it. I don’t know. But what I took from this experience was that South Africa was a prison for most of its people and being put in prison gave me a little bit of insight into what it was like to have your freedom taken away. It still happens in our world that the choices some people have are so limited. So I think that prison must have helped stir my imagination into trying to understand what it was like not to have the freedoms that I had so easily taken for granted.

Agathe
My name is Agathe, it’s nice to meet you. We read Journey to Jo’burg and there was a white doctor, in the story, who worked night and day to look after black people. So, is this character based on someone you know, and were there many people like him?

BN: Well, writers of fiction generally don’t base characters directly on people they know. It’s quite dangerous to do that because people might not like how you have shown them and sue you. But I’m observing people all the time and I want my work to be credible and my characters believable. And so yes, there were not many, but there were some white doctors who were very dedicated. And, as it happened, I had a young cousin - who I never met - who was a doctor but who also worked as an unpaid trade unionist in South Africa. In fact, he ended up in jail as a political detainee and had his life taken away by his police interrogators. His name was Neil Aggett and if you look at the end of my book Burn My Heart, there is a short interview in which I mention him. (He’s not ‘Mathew’ in the novel but he was born into that world of 1950s colonial Kenya, during the Mau Mau resistance to the white settlers.)

But you know, that doctor in Journey to Jo’burg , we get a glimpse of him - just a glimpse - because I was looking at that story from the viewpoint of Naledi and Tiro. For most young black South Africans, if they came into contact with white people they were generally very negative experiences. But I wanted those children just to have that glimpse of that doctor (and I don’t even say he’s white – you picked up he is white - I speak about him looking very pale) just to show that there were people like that. In another novel, Chain of Fire (a sequel to Journey to Jo’burg) again there’s one young white person who is with the Resistance Committee. Most of them were black but there was one white person and I wanted, again, just to show that let’s not forget that it was possible for white people to make that choice. You know, there will be white people who will say that ‘I couldn’t do anything else [except to go along with apartheid]. It wasn’t possible.’ But it was possible. It’s important to remember that choice is always possible. I don’t know whether I went through all these thought processes when I wrote the doctor but it reflects that. There are people who want to try and change a situation and to make a contribution, and that’s good. Even if they can’t change it, it’s good to try.


Elliot

We would like to know if your decision to write a book is always based on a message you want to transmit; that you want children to know what is happening in a certain place?

BN: I would say that I do not set out to send you a message because that is the kind of schooling that I had as a child. I was told what to think. The people who were my teachers were kind and they thought they were doing it all for my good to tell me what was in the books that I was studying. I would write down in my notes: this is what the author means, this is the message here. Now writing fiction is much more creative than that. As a writer, I have to go on a journey. When I start I writing, I don’t necessarily know what is going to be the end. There is something I want to explore. I put my characters in situations that are dangerous. There are choices and I want to see what they will do, what’s possible for them and what’s not possible for them. I hope my reader will also go on this journey and, in the process, that my reader will begin exploring what it is like to be those young people who are my main characters. That for me is important, it’s important that my readers ask questions like you are doing. That to me is the most important thing; that my readers read creatively and respond creatively and begin to use their imaginations to enter the lives of my characters and go beyond those lives with their own questions for their own journeys. That’s what I think I really hope to achieve when I write for young people.




Lucille

Hello my name is Lucille nice to meet you. Now we would like to ask you some of the questions we have asked ourselves about The Other Side of Truth. We have tried to interpret the cover and we would like to know the meaning you wanted to convey.

BN: Well, I don’t actually design the covers. This edition is published by Penguin and they have in their young readers’ section a design department. The designers may ask me what I might like to see but they don’t always follow it because they are the designers. If I show you this book here - my novel Burn my Heart - can you see the similarity in the design?
Yes.

But this is the original cover of The Other Side of Truth in the UK.

I love this face although I don’t know who the person is. It came from a photographic library and the designers fiddled around with her hair in order to get it the way that I thought would be right, and there behind her is a picture of the Tower of London and a London bus. But when they were bringing out Burn my Heart in 2007, they said ‘Let’s redesign the cover for The Other Side of Truth and decided to have something more abstract. So here they came up with the idea of a hand… the mother’s hand, perhaps? It is an imaginative cover and I like it because it leaves room for imagination.

There are different covers for the various translations. This is the cover in Taiwan in a Chinese edition.

On the title page there is an amazing image, a line drawing in black and white. It shows three figures in the palm of a giant hand. The people are together carrying a great pencil and they seem to be running as the fingers of the hand threaten to crush them at any moment. These are American editions. This was the very first American cover, a very elegant cover.

Some of these covers, they’ve asked me about, some they haven’t, or I’m shown it when it is almost ready. If I really don’t like it, it can be too late. But you know, the attitude is sometimes that I’m only the author. It has happened where an edition has been made in another country and they haven’t bothered to ask and there’s little or nothing I can do. Fortunately, most of the covers I think are interesting and if they are imaginative then I’m very happy with them.

Laure…
Hello

Hello

My name is Laure, nice to meet you.

Thank you.

Are you feelings or your experiences of being an exile reflected in this book The Other Side of Truth?

BN: I think they are. But when I was writing the novel, I wasn't thinking about my own experience at all. I think it came very subconsciously. You see when I left into exile, I was 21 going on 22. I had chosen a path. I was much older than Sade and Femi and I also didn't have the same frightening experiences of racism to deal with as they do. I was white, and when I arrived in Britain, some people would be very interested. When I opened my mouth, they heard I spoke with a South African accent, and nobody said "What you doing here? Are you coming to take our jobs? Why are you here? Why don't you go back where you came from?" No one said that to me. But I still had a very deep sense of disconnection. I came to study at the University of York. I remember having to write an essay - I think it was about T S Eliot- and wandering around, thinking, "I must think about the essay." But my head was back in South Africa. I was thinking about my brother and his friends in prison. That's where my head was. So very often my body was in England, but my head was back in South Africa. But I was also fortunate because I met people who, I felt, had some kind of understanding of what I might have gone through.
One of those people has a connection with France. He was my professor of education. His name was Harry Rée and he had been in the SOE – Special Operations Executive – working ‘underground’ with the French Resistance during the Second World War. He was a fluent French speaker and had actually helped to blow up the Peugeot factory with the help of the French Resistance. Although he never spoke about his experiences of being in the resistance at that time, I knew that had been his experience and I knew he would have some kind of understanding of where I was coming from. Sade and Femi don't have that until perhaps the social worker, Jenny Iyawo. She's kind to them and she says – oh no, it’s Mama Appiah who says she can tell that something bad and terrible has happened to them. Sade can feel the emotion welling up in her but has to suppress it.
So I think I have had some of that, but in a very different way, and that's what writers do. We have to transform experience. We have to look into ourselves: to see, to think, to imagine, to draw on our own experience, and imagine… And you see I am also obliged to imagine when I write younger characters because I’m no longer that age. So I’m imagining someone much younger than myself who has come from a very different background to myself and I always say, to write the kind of fiction that I do, I need the flour to make the bread, but I need the yeast. And the yeast is imagination. To make it believable.
There’s one other thing I want to add on to that, just one other point to add on. It’s about the way in which Sade remembers her mother, through the words that her mother has said. That is another important way she has of holding on to the past. I too would remember things that my brother, and friends had told me in South Africa. And that was another aspect that probably emerged in the novel.

Guillaume


My name is Guillaume, nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you!

So, my question is, what do you understand by the title The Other Side of Truth?

BN: Right, well, I think for that that I need to point you to a little quotation in the frontpiece of the book, a little extract from a poem by John Donne “On a huge hill,/ Cragged and steep, Truth stands, and he that will/ / Reach her, about must, and about must go.” I read that that poem many many years ago and I probably didn’t understand it when I read it first. But somehow that image of Truth on top of a mountain somewhere remained with me. Have you had an experience of climbing a mountain and you think you’re heading for the summit and suddenly you’ve lost it? You can’t see where it is any more and then you go another little distance and you see it again but that peak you looked at now seems different from this perspective, from this view point. You go on some more and it’s different again - and yet that peak is the same peak. My title “The Other Side of Truth” has a certain enigmatic quality. Your truth may not be someone else’s truth. You can be convinced of something but I might see it from another angle so what we may argue about our truths. Sade’s Mama had sayings like “A lie has seven winding paths, the truth one straight road” and another is “Truth keeps the hands cleaner than soap”. The children’s father’s believes in the importance of telling the truth - and I’m glad he believed in telling the truth - but it led to terrible consequences for his children. So I wanted a title that gave some of the complexity around truth.

Okay thank you very much.

Aha!!! If it’s left you puzzled don’t worry, I too am puzzled!!!

Okay thank you very much.

Can I say something just before we go on. I want to add one more thing about truth. Some of the most dangerous people are those who are convinced that only their truth and their way of seeing the world is the right way. So that’s another aspect to it. Thank you, sorry, it is your turn!!

Margaux
Hello, my name is Margaux, nice to meet you. We know that you actually stood in the queue in front of the ‘Immigration and Nationality building’, to imagine what it must be like to be a refugee and asylum seeker. Did you do this for any other situations in the book?
BN: Well, you know, you are really asking me about how I do my research, and I did a lot of research. I was fortunate, I have very, very close Nigerian friends, and I had the good fortune to be in Ghana in January 1998 and I came back to England through Lagos. It was just a weekend and still the time when General Sani Abacha, the brutal military dictator, was in power. My friends met me at the airport and they took me to Ife and to Ibadan. They knew I wanted to see those places. During the weekend I took a number of photographs with a little plastic disposable camera. I was worried that the police might take it. Soldiers also constantly stopped us on the road at roadblocks. So that experience then helped me. I’d never been to Lagos before and my mind was absorbing everything very quickly, very deeply. It was an extraordinary experience - just one weekend. It was like my mind was a camera, my mind was a recording instrument. I came back with those photographs in my disposable camera, and of course, deeply in my mind, that experience. So that was one small part of my research.
I spent a lot of time on London streets and going to places to find out about the experiences of refugees and asylum seekers. I also went into schools in London and Bristol where I did workshops with young people. I asked them, “What is the first thing you need when you are new to the school?” and every time they said, “Get a friend.” So I knew how important friendship was. I remember going and standing outside the television centre in Gray’s Inn Road. I thought, “Where could my children, Sade and Femi, hang out?” It was near where my daughter was a student in London at the time. So one night - it was wet and drizzly - I hung out around there, looking to see where would be a good place to shelter.It helped me to imagine their experience. But I also allow myself the freedom to change aspects. That’s what writers do. You want to be credible but you mustn’t just feel that you have got to limit yourself to how this was and how that was. Emotional, imaginative truth is the most important.
Thank you!

Marie

We would like to know why you use nicknames.

BN: Sade loves giving people names. Do you ever give anybody nicknames? You do? It can be done in friendship. But I think there is a difference between giving a nickname to somebody who has got no power and to people who are more powerful. Sade’s nicknames are not nicknames that put people down in the way that Marcia deliberately mispronounces ‘Sade’ and calls her ‘Miss Sha-day-aday’. There is a strong bullying element to this. It’s different with Sade. When Sade gives a nickname, it has an element of empowering her. These are people who are more powerful and they are older. She loves language. She loves playing with words and, in a way, giving a nickname gives her a grasp of the situation. ‘OK, this person hasn’t told me what their name is but I’ll call them Hawk Man and Hawk Lady.’ She doesn’t think about it, she does it quite naturally. Language is empowering and fortunately Sade has this love of language and uses it to help her grasp a situation. She has probably always done this, but now it comes in very useful to her psychologically. Thank you for that question.



Raphaelle

Hello, my name is Raphaelle. In your book Sade is bullied by Marcia and her gang and are you trying to make children aware of the cruelty of this act?

BN: Well, you know, bullying is cruel and they are being cruel. But I think I was reflecting not only on how young people can be cruel, but we are all capable of cruelty. However, Sade cannot understand why Marcia is using racism as part of this cruelty because part of Marcia’s family comes from Jamaica. Sade understands the connection between Jamaica and Africa and so she asks herself ‘what it is that they have against Africans?’ To me there is an echo of what has happened to her father. Look at how the military government at that time was abusing its power. Here Sade is experiencing this bullying by another young person whom she might have hoped would be an ally. Instead Marcia abuses that power over her.

Guillaume

Do you think that when Sade contacts the newsreader this could happen in real life? Has this ever happened?

BN: I think what is important for me is that what I write is credible, not that it has actually happened - but that it could. Now, we have to remember that Sade is the daughter of a journalist - an outspoken journalist - and she has always had this bond with her father. So she has an idea of the power of words, the power of communication. At the time I was writing this novel, I came across a television programme for young people in the UK. I think it was called “Children’s Express”. It was a programme about journalism, about reporting the news, and that actively included young people. The journalist who worked with the young people on this programme was a man called Jon Snow. We have a TV channel here called ‘Channel 4’ where he is the main news presenter at 7pm and, by the way, he always seems to wear different coloured ties! He was the adult presenter working with the children on ‘Children’s Express’. I saw it one day, by chance, and I loved the respect he gave to the young children journalists. There was a twelve- year-old sitting next to him and the way he asked his questions - and the way they spoke to each other – it was as if he was working with another adult journalist. It made an impression on me. I began to think what if Sade happened to see this programme? Her school could be using this programme. She would see this journalist; would know that he worked on a live TV channel; and she might begin to think that maybe this was their one big hope. That is why I felt this was credible. Of course, Femi thinks the idea is crazy. But then she is his older sister and quite bossy at times, so he goes along with it. By the way, the real Jon Snow has done the foreword to this book. I didn’t ask his permission when I created my Mr Seven o’Clock News. Of course, it isn’t actually him and, in a way, it’s my little joke and I was delighted when he kindly agreed to do the foreword to this book. Yes, I hope it’s credible, I hope you believed it.

Rodolphe

What do you want to write about next?

BN: I spoke earlier about a young second cousin of mine, Neil Aggett, who was a medical doctor in South Africa. He would work a couple of nights a week in the casualty department of a very busy hospital in Soweto in order to earn the money to work for the rest of the week as an unpaid trade-union organiser. It was important that workers gained rights as part of a strong workers’ movement to resist the tremendous exploitation that went unchecked in South Africa for so long. I never met my cousin. He had been born in Kenya at the time of the Mau Mau rebellion against the white settlers to regain their land. Soon after Neil’s family came to live in South Africa, I left the country for England and what became exile. Later, when Neil became a university student, he began to see things very differently from his parents and, breaking away, especially from his father, he now dedicated himself to resisting apartheid through the union movement. Some years later, he was arrested with a whole number of people, including other young white activists working with black comrades. Neil never came out of jail alive. His father and the family were shattered but, at the time, they didn’t really understand the wider significance of Neil’s death. There was an extraordinary funeral in which thousands of workers, black workers, came out on the streets of Johannesburg to follow his coffin and to lay him into the grave. Very many black detainees had died while in the hands of the police. Many of their deaths didn’t even make the news. Internationally, only Steve Biko’s name was well known. But now, for the first time, a young white detainee had died while being interrogated by the police - and, suddenly, there was huge media interest. There was an inquest and Neil’s father, who had been estranged from his son, spared no expense in appointing top lawyers to represent the family. In the inquest, the evidence came out of torture - the terrible torture to which Neil and others had been subjected. Nevertheless, the magistrate gave the verdict that no one was to blame. The police said that he had committed suicide and refused to accept that if he had committed suicide it was because a healthy young man had been broken to the point where he might take his life. So, to come back to your question, I’ve wanted to find out more about what lies behind this story of a young man who had transformed himself. I met Neil’s parents for the first time in 1991, after I was able to go back freely to South Africa, and I was very moved. His parents were clearly haunted by this terrible thing. What a terrible way to begin to know and understand more about your son. I was also curious that in our family, here in a younger generation was someone else who had chosen the path of resisting apartheid. Of course there was also a terrible injustice. However Neil died, the police were responsible and I wanted to find out more about Neil, about who he became and why his interrogators had it in for him. So I’ve been investigating. Behind his story lies a bigger story too. It will be a biography, partly memoir, for adult readers. I’ve done lots of interviews and it is tough because I am not writing fiction and have to double check, treble check everything. It’s another journey for me.

Beverley Naidoo à JB.

Nous, élèves de Terminale L, avons eu la chance de voir éclore au sein de notre classe de spécialité anglais un projet des plus ambitieux orchestré par notre professeur d’anglais qui a eu la bonne idée de contacter Madame Beverley Naidoo, auteure du livre que nous sommes en train d’étudier pour le baccalauréat, The Other Side Of Truth.
Remercions tout d’abord cette charmante auteure d’avoir eu l’amabilité de se déplacer afin notamment de nous éclairer sur le sens de son œuvre, sur les thèmes abordés en classe et de nous donner un bagage culturel des plus utiles en vue de notre baccalauréat qui approche à grands pas.
Mais voyons au-delà du côté scolaire de la chose ! Cette opportunité nous aura permis de nous ouvrir à la culture africaine si négligée dans sa diversité et si souvent qualifiée de façon stéréotypée.
Beverley Naidoo a ainsi effectué un séjour de trois jours en France, du 10 au 12 mai, séjour semé de diverses activités : conférence et échange avec des élèves de JB mais aussi de Vernon, visite du jardin et de la maison de Monet à Giverny, représentation de la pièce adaptée spécialement de The Other Side of Truth pour l’occasion par David Stevens et jouée avec talent par les élèves de Première L


Nous n’aurions sincèrement pas cru qu’une auteure de cette envergure pût venir jusqu’en France, mais la persévérance de notre professeur d’anglais et du cadre éducatif nous a réellement fait bénéficier de cette incroyable rencontre, véritable leçon de tolérance et d’ouverture au monde.

Marie TESTU et Joséphine FORT, élèves de Terminale L

Damilola Taylor

Beverley Naidoo dedicated her book, The Other Side Of Truth to a young boy, Damilola Taylor :

Damilola Taylor was born on 7th December 1989 in Nigeria. All who knew him described him as a sensitive and exuberant boy who loved life and lit up the room when he walked into it with his infectious good humour and winning smile. He enjoyed sport, particularly football and was an ardent Manchester United supporter.His sister, Gbemi suffered from a severe form of epilepsy and Damilola's ambition was to follow a career in medical research in order to find a cure for her and others like her. In Summer 2000, in order to gain the necessary treatment for Gbemi, Damilola, his brother and mother, Gloria moved to England, settling in Peckham. His father, Richard remained in Nigeria to support the family by maintaining his Civil Service career. Damilola began the new academic year at Oliver Goldsmith School. On 27th November 2000, Damilola set off for home from his studies at a local library, he was never to reach home alive.After 3 long trials, Damilola's killers were finally brought to Justice and are now serving time. They were aged 12 and 13. Damilola's death raised many questions about the baseline values in our society and what leads young people to commit such acts of violence. When Damilola was just ten years old he wrote: "I will travel far and wide to choose my destiny to remould the world. I know it is my destiny to defend the world which I hope to achieve in my lifetime". A boy with great vision would sadly never see his dreams fulfilled due to a senseless act of violence. The Damilola Taylor Trust was set up to honour his memory by working in the community to try and help bring about changes for the better.

This event then became the inspiration of Web of Lies, the sequel to The Other Side Of Truth.

Beverley Naidoo's big Iyawo and Oko

Ken Saro Wiwa

Ken Saro-Wiwa I’ll tell you this, I may be dead but my ideas will not die. Ken Saro-Wiwa 1995

Ken Saro-Wiwa was born in October 1941, the eldest son of a prominent family in Ogoni, which is today in Rivers State, Nigeria. After leaving university he initially pursued an academic career.

During the Biafran war (1967-1970) he was a Civilian Administrator for the Port of Bonny, near Ogoni in the Niger Delta. He went on to be a businessman, novelist and television producer. His long-running satirical TV series Basi & Co was purported to be the most watched soap opera in Africa.

Two of his best known works were drawn from his observations and experiences of the Biafran war. His most famous work, Sozaboy: a Novel in Rotten English, is a harrowing tale of a naive village boy recruited into the army. On a Darkling Plain, is a diary of his experiences during the war.

Ken Saro-Wiwa was consistently concerned about the treatment of Ogoni within the Nigerian Federation and in 1973 was dismissed from his post as Regional Commissioner for Education in the Rivers State cabinet, for advocating greater Ogoni autonomy.

During the 1970s he built up his businesses in real estate and retail and in the 1980s concentrated on his writing, journalism and television production.

Throughout his work he often made references to the exploitation he saw around him as the oil and gas industry took riches from the beneath the feet of the poor Ogoni farmers, and in return left them polluted and disenfranchised.

In his book of short stories, Forest of Flowers (1986), the following passage from the story Night Ride, reflects Saro-Wiwa's anger at what he was seeing around him:

An old woman had hobbled up to him. My son, they arrived this morning and dug up my entire farm, my only farm. They mowed down the toil of my brows, the pride of the waiting months. They say they will pay me compensation. Can they compensate me for my labours? The joy I receive when I see the vegetables sprouting, God's revelation to me in my old age? Oh my son, what can I do?

What answer now could he give her? I'll look into it later, he had replied tamely.

Look into it later. He could almost hate himself for telling that lie. He cursed the earth for spouting oil, black gold, they called it. And he cursed the gods for not drying the oil wells. What did it matter that millions of barrels of oil were mined and exported daily, so long as this poor woman wept those tears of despair? What could he look into later? Could he make alternate land available? And would the lawmakers revise the laws just to bring a bit more happiness to these unhappy wretches whom the search for oil had reduced to an animal existence? They ought to send the oil royalties to the men whose farms and land were despoiled and ruined. But the lawyers were in the pay of the oil companies and the government people in the pay of the lawyers and the companies. So how could he look into it later?

In 1990, Saro-Wiwa started to dedicate himself to the amelioration of the problems of the oil producing regions of the Niger Delta. Focusing on his homeland, Ogoni, he launched a non-violent movement for social and ecological justice. In this role he attacked the oil companies and the Nigerian government accusing them of waging an ecological war against the Ogoni and precipitating the genocide of the Ogoni people. He was so effective, that by 1993 the oil companies had to pull out of Ogoni. This cost him his life.

The Ogoni have been gradually ground to dust by the combined effort of the multi-national oil company, Shell Petroleum Development Company, the murderous ethnic majority in Nigeria and the country’s military dictatorships.
Ken Saro-Wiwa - 1992

Shell started producing oil in the Delta in 1958. In 1970 the first seeds of the current conflict were sown when Ogoni Chiefs handed a petition to the local Military Governor complaining about Shell, then operating a joint venture with BP. According to the petition, the company was "seriously threatening the well-being, and even the very lives" of the Ogoni. That year there was a major blow-out at the Bomu oilfield in Ogoni. It continued for three weeks, causing widespread pollution and outrage.

By the eighties other communities were beginning to protest. The Iko people wrote to Shell in 1980 demanding, "compensation and restitution of our rights to clean air, water and a viable environment where we can source for our means of livelihood."

In 1987, when the Iko once again held a peaceful demonstration against Shell, the notorious Mobile Police Force (MPF), locally known as “kill-and-go” was called. 40 houses were destroyed and 350 people were made homeless by the MPF’s attack.

In August 1990, the Ogoni elders signed the Ogoni Bill of Rights, which called for "political control of Ogoni affairs by Ogoni people, control and use of Ogoni economic resources for Ogoni development, adequate and direct representation as of right for Ogoni people in all Nigerian national institutions and the right to protect the Ogoni environment and ecology from further degradation". That year the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), a non-violent action group, was formed.

Community protests against Shell continued to spread across the Delta. Next was the turn of the Etche at Umuechem. In response to a peaceful demonstration, Shell specifically requested the presence of the MPF, who subsequently massacred up to 80 people and destroyed nearly 500 homes. The community submission to the official inquiry into the disaster argued that Shell’s "drilling operations have had serious adverse effects on the Umuechem people who are predominantly farmers …Their farmlands are covered by oil spillage/blow-out and rendered unsuitable for farming". Anti-Shell protests spread to other communities including the Omudiogo, Ogbia, Igbide, Izon, Irri, Uzure, and Ijaw.

By the early nineties, the Ogoni, led by Saro-Wiwa, were beginning to seek international help for their plight. By now, Saro-Wiwa was spending more and more of his time abroad, including in the US and Europe, drumming up support for the Ogoni. In August 1991, exactly a year after first being signed, the Ogoni Bill of Rights was amended to authorize MOSOP to make an appeal to the international community for assistance, after they had received no reply from the Nigerian military government.

In July 1992, Saro-Wiwa addressed the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Peoples in Geneva. "I speak on behalf of the Ogoni people. You will forgive me if I am somewhat emotional about this matter. I am Ogoni … Petroleum was discovered in Ogoni in 1958 and since then an estimated 100 billion dollars worth of oil and gas has been carted away from Ogoniland. In return for this the Ogoni people have received nothing."

As part of his evidence to the UN Working Group, Saro-Wiwa submitted the Ogoni Bill of Rights and a new book he had published called, Genocide in Nigeria: The Ogoni Tragedy. In the book, Saro-Wiwa wrote about how he had watched helplessly as the Ogoni had, "been gradually ground to dust by the combined effort of the multi-national oil company, Shell Petroleum Development Company, the murderous ethnic majority in Nigeria and the country’s military dictatorships”. He wrote of Shell’s double standards, comparing the standards of its Nigerian operations to its European ones. Because of this, and the affect oil was having on the Ogoni, he accused Shell of genocide and racism.

By the Autumn of 1992 the Ogoni were gearing up their campaign against the oil industry. In October Saro-Wiwa was in London again. "It’s just going to get worse, unless the international community intervenes", he warned. The following month on 3 December, MOSOP presented its demands to those oil companies operating in Ogoni, including Shell, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and Chevron. The companies had to pay back-royalties and compensation within 30 days or quit Ogoniland.

But of course the oil companies did not quit. So on 4th January 1993, some 300,000 Ogoni celebrated the Year of Indigenous Peoples by peacefully protesting against Shell's activities and the environmental destruction of Ogoniland. It remains the largest demonstration against an oil company ever. "We have woken up to find our lands devastated by agents of death called oil companies. Our atmosphere has been totally polluted, our lands degraded, our waters contaminated, our trees poisoned, so much so that our flora and fauna have virtually disappeared", said an Ogoni leader to the crowd. 4th January became known as Ogoni Day.

Leaked minutes of meetings held by Shell the following month indicate that the company was worried by the protests. The minutes show that Shell departments in London and Nigeria were, "to keep each other more closely informed to ensure that movements of key players, what they say and to whom is more effectively monitored to avoid unpleasant surprises and adversely affect the reputation of the Group as a whole".

By April 1993 Saro-Wiwa had been arrested twice. Willbros, a contractor working for Shell, called in government troops in response to the demonstrations by the Ogoni. Eleven people were injured when the security forces opened fire. One woman, Karalolo Korgbara, later lost her arm. According to a letter from Willbros to Shell "Fortunately there was a military presence to control the situation". A month later, another Ogoni was shot dead and a further twenty were injured. Shell later admitted that “field allowances and transportation” of an army unit were provided by Willbros, but denied that this unit were involved in the shooting. Amnesty International later issued an 'Urgent Action' request, concerned about possible extra-judicial executions by the military against Ogoni protestors.

Saro-Wiwa was repeatedly denied from travelling abroad and in June he was arrested again and charged with six counts of unlawful assembly and conspiring to publish a seditious pamphlet. Soldiers were moved into Port Harcourt, in response to demonstrations about the arrests. MOSOP reported indiscriminate beatings and arrests . Saro-Wiwa’s health deteriorated in custody, resulting in him being moved to hospital and suffering serious heart problems during interrogation. He complained of "psychological torture". Saro-Wiwa later published an account of his detention in a book called A Month and a Day.

By now the Ogoni were suffering escalating violence, ostensibly it was conflicts with neighbouring tribes, but much of the violence was being orchestrated by the military. MOSOP blamed the military for inciting the clashes and Shell for its complicity in the violence.

Throughout the year the 'attacks by neighbouring tribes' against the Ogoni continued. So did the violence against protestors. In October 93, two Ogoni were wounded, and one killed by soldiers, who had been transported by Shell, in the company's words, to "dialogue" with the community. These soldiers from the 2nd Amphibious Brigade, under the control of the notorious Major Okuntimo, were paid 'field allowances' by Shell, although Shell has expressed "doubt as to whether any member of the community was shot or wounded." Saro-Wiwa’s brother, Owens, who is a doctor, carried out the autopsy . Harassment of other key Ogoni continued too. In December, Owens Wiwa and senior MOSOP official, Ledum Mitee were arrested and detained without charge until the 4th January.

When General Aback took over control of Nigeria in the autumn of 1993, the situation worsened for MOSOP. Abacha appointed the Rivers State Internal Security Task Force under Lt.Col Komo and Major Okuntimo. In April, a memo was sent from Komo to Okuntimo, entitled "Restoration of Law and Order in Ogoniland" It gave details for an extensive military presence in Ogoni, drawing resources from the army, air force, navy, and police, including both the Mobile Police Force and conventional units. In a move meant to facilitate the reopening of oil installations, one of the missions of this operation was to ensure that those "carrying out business ventures ... within Ogoniland are not molested".

Saro-Wiwa, commenting on the memo above, said "This is it - they are going to arrest us all and execute us. All for Shell." The following month Okuntimo sent a "restricted" memo back to Komo remarking that "Shell operations still impossible unless ruthless military operations are undertaken for smooth economic activities to commence". To counter this, Okuntimo recommended: "Wasting operations during MOSOP and other gatherings making constant military presence justifiable."

HYPERLINK "http://www.remembersarowiwa.com/deathksw.htm" The Death of Ken Saro-Wiwa

"I and my colleagues are not the only ones on trial. Shell is here on trial and it is as well that it is represented by counsel said to be holding a watching brief. The Company has, indeed, ducked this particular trial, but its day will surely come and the lessons learnt here may prove useful to it for there is no doubt in my mind that the ecological war that the company has waged in the Delta will be called to question sooner than later and the crimes of that war be duly punished. The crime of the Company’s dirty wars against the Ogoni people will also be punished."
Ken Saro-Wiwa - 1995

Nine days after Okuntimo’s memo, on 21st May, four conservative Ogoni leaders were killed in Gokana, giving the military an excuse to "justify" a military presence, to undertake “wasting operations". There is no doubt the killings of the Ogoni leaders were brutal. According to Human Rights Watch, “These men were reportedly attacked by a mob and beaten and hacked to death, but the precise chain of events leading to the murders is a source of great controversy”.

There are "disputed" reports as to what happened that day, according to the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisation (UNPO) that sent a delegation to Ogoni in 1995, "with questions raised by other circumstances around the murders". One of these was the tension between the Gokana Ogoni chiefs and MOSOP, but MOSOP denied any involvement in the killings.

Andrew Rowell writing in the book Green Backlash argues that: "Other suspicious happenings occurred that day too, which have led MOSOP to believe that the whole event was a complete set-up. Eye witness accounts talk of Ogoni ‘filled with soldiers’ in the morning before the killings, as if they were waiting for something to happen. These security forces did nothing when alerted of the disturbances to prevent the killings, although they were asked to quash the growing dissent. …There are too many other coincidences to suggest that agent provocateurs were not used, although conclusive proof will probably never be discernible."

An anonymous Ogoni interviewed for the film Delta Force shown on Channel Four in the UK on 4th May 1995 recalls how: "Everywhere was quiet and then on the morning of May 21st … as we woke up in the morning most of the Ogoni villages were filled with soldiers and mobile policemen armed with sophisticated weapons. We don’t know why they just came, it was only when 4 prominent Ogoni sons were killed later in the afternoon of that day that we Ogoni ever knew that there was a grand design to cause disturbances in Ogoni in order to create an excuse for the government to send in more troops".

The following day, Saro-Wiwa, Ledum Mitee and several others were arrested in connection to the deaths, although not formally charged. Amnesty International issued a statement that Saro-Wiwa's arrest was "part of the continuing suppression by the Nigerian authorities of the Ogoni people's campaign against the oil companies" and declared Saro-Wiwa a "prisoner of conscience - held because of his non-violent political activities."

Whilst Saro-Wiwa was routinely tortured in prison, put in leg-irons, and denied access to family, friends, a lawyer and medication, the Internal Security Task Force, "ostensibly searching for those directly responsible for the killings", started "deliberately terrorising the whole community, assaulting and beating indiscriminately", according to Amnesty International. Over the next few months, hundreds of Ogoni were arrested, beaten, intimidated and killed. Many young girls, older women and pregnant women were raped. Thousands fled in terror into the bush as Okuntimo's soldiers looted hundreds of villages destroying houses in a systematic campaign of terror to 'sanitize Ogoni'. Okuntimo told a British environmentalist he detained that "he was doing it all for Shell ... But he was not happy because the last time he had asked Shell to pay his men their out-station allowances he had been refused which was not the usual procedure".

Later that year Saro-Wiwa and MOSOP were awarded the HYPERLINK "http://www.rightlivelihood.org/recip/saro-wiwa.htm" \t "_blank" Right Livelihood Award (known as the alternative Nobel peace prize), for Saro-Wiwa’s "exemplary and selfless courage and in striving non-violently for the civil, economic and environmental rights of his people". Some eight months after being arrested in January 1995, Saro-Wiwa and four other Ogoni were finally charged with the murder of the four Ogoni leaders.

The following month an affidavit was signed by one of the two chief prosecution witnesses, Charles Danwi. It alleged that he had been bribed by Shell and others to testify against Saro-Wiwa. It read: "He was told that he would be given a house, a contract from Shell and Ompadec and some money ... He was given 30,000 Naira ... At a later meeting security agents, government officials and …representatives of Shell and Ompadec were all present." Another affidavit from the other Chief prosecution witness, Nayone Akpa, was signed alleging that he was offered "30,000 Naira, employment with the Gokana Local Government, weekly allowances and contracts with Ompadec and Shell" if he signed a document that implicated Saro-Wiwa too.

Shell of course denies bribing the prosecution witnesses, but it was meeting secretly with the Nigerian military and government. In March 1995, a meeting took place between four senior Shell officials, the Nigerian High Commissioner and the Nigerian Army and Police at the Shell Centre in London where a strategy was planned against the protests.

But the protests continued. Saro-Wiwa's brother, Owens Wiwa, secretly met the head of Shell Nigeria, Brian Anderson between May and July in order to explore ways of securing Saro-Wiwa's release. Anderson told Owens that “He would be able to help us get Ken freed if we stopped the protest campaign abroad”.

The military tribunal/trial against Saro-Wiwa and the others started in February 1995, when the men were finally allowed to see their lawyers. In May 1995, Saro-Wiwa smuggled a letter out of a military hospital. He wrote "For two nights I have not slept a wink, I am being intimidated, harassed and de-humanized, even though I am supposed to be receiving medical attention ... I am like Ogoni, battered, bruised, brutalized, bloodied and almost buried".

A Report into Saro-Wiwa’s trial written by leading British counsel, Michael Birnbaum QC, concluded "It is my view that the breaches of fundamental rights are so serious as to arouse grave concern that any trial before this tribunal will be fundamentally flawed and unfair". Amongst many misgivings, Birnbaum was particularly concerned about the undue influence of Major Okuntimo at the trial. In Late October, Saro-Wiwa and eight other Ogoni were sentenced to death. Six of the fifteen defendants were released, including Ledum Mitee, Vice President of MOSOP.

Saro-Wiwa wrote for his closing testimony at the trial: "I and my colleagues are not the only ones on trial. Shell is here on trial and it is as well that it is represented by counsel said to be holding a watching brief. The Company has, indeed, ducked this particular trial, but its day will surely come and the lessons learnt here may prove useful to it for there is no doubt in my mind that the ecological war that the company has waged in the Delta will be called to question sooner than later and the crimes of that war be duly punished. The crime of the Company’s dirty wars against the Ogoni people will also be punished."

As leaders of the Commonwealth gathered in Auckland, the Nigerian government's Provisional Ruling Council confirmed the death sentences. Despite Shell’s repeated claims it could not get involved in the legal process in Nigeria, the company issued a statement in response to the confirmation of the death sentences which acknowledged that a letter had been sent to Abacha asking for clemency.

On 10 November 1995, Saro-Wiwa and eight others were executed in defiance of international appeals for leniency. There was international condemnation and outrage against both the military junta and Shell. The condemnation led to the strengthening of limited sanctions, and Nigeria was suspended from the Commonwealth. U.K. Prime Minister John Major, described the trial as, "a fraudulent trial, a bad verdict, an unjust sentence. It has now been followed by judicial murder".

HYPERLINK "http://www.remembersarowiwa.com/after.htm" After the Executions

"In recent months since the anniversary of the judicial murder of, ...Ken Saro-Wiwa, ...a frightening wave of state terrorism has been unleashed on the area with the deployment of over 2000 armed soldiers. ...Ogoni stands in the threshold of complete extinction".
MOSOP Statement 1997

Just days after the murder, Shell announced that it would press ahead with a $3.8 billion liquid natural gas project in Nigeria. "There have been suggestions that the project should be deferred or cancelled because of recent events in Nigeria. But you have to be clear who would be hurt," said Shell. Greenpeace criticized the move as sending the strongest possible message to the military regime that it was "business as usual".

The next month, Brian Anderson, the Managing Director of Shell Nigeria admitted to the Sunday Times that a "black hole of corruption" existed in Shell’s Nigerian operations. Ledum Mitee interviewed by the newspaper recalled that, "He [Okuntimo] admitted he was being paid by Shell". Mitee also explained that, “Shell provided vehicles for military operations".

In January the following year thousands of Ogoni celebrated Ogoni Day, despite a military clampdown. Soldiers and Mobile Police fired tear gas and live ammunition killing four youths. Two months later, The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reported that 1,000 Ogonis had fled to Benin since Ogoni Day. Though the numbers were relatively small the UNHCR called the rate of increase "worrisome". That month, the US State Department declared that Nigeria constituted a "classic picture of human rights abuse". The report described Saro-Wiwa’s trial "completely lacking in respect for due process". In May, the European Parliament condemned Nigeria’s "appalling human rights record" and said the European Union should impose an oil embargo.

In May 1996, Ken Saro-Wiwa was posthumously elected to the United Nations Environment Programme's (UNEP) Global 500 Roll of Honour for advancing the cause of environmental protection. "At all stages of his campaign, Saro-Wiwa advocated peaceful resistance to the forces that would deprive the Ogoni people of a say in the development of their region", UNEP said in a statement.

Also that month Shell offered a "Plan of Action for Ogoni", where the company offered to clean up all oil spills in the region and rehabilitate some of its community projects. But Shell suffered a PR setback when Bopp van Dessel, Shell’s former head of environmental studies in Nigeria, spoke on the TV programme, World In Action, saying that Shell ignored repeated warnings that its oil production operations in Nigeria were causing widespread environmental damage. "They were not meeting their own standards, they were not meeting international standards. Any Shell site that I saw was polluted. Any terminal that I saw was polluted. It is clear to me that Shell was devastating the area", he said.

Also that May, MOSOP reported that Major Obi, the new Head of the Rivers State Internal Security Task Force, had summoned two secret meetings of chiefs in the Ogoni villages of Kpor and Bori, during which they were forced to sign documents calling for Shell's return to Ogoni. By July Lt. Col. Komo, the Military Administer of Rivers State was said to be in consultation with Shell over the company's return to Ogoni. Komo "expressed pleasure that his talks with Shell have been positive as the company will soon return to Ogoniland".

By September Shell had held a meeting with the Rivers State Internal Security Task Force and certain groups in Ogoni but not MOSOP: "Our plan is to return to Ogoniland and clean up the pollution in the area, start community assistance projects, take stock of our facilities and when the time is right, start production again" said Shell. MOSOP accused Shell of employing "divide-and-rule tactics" and accused the oil company of paying N50,000 for signatures of Village Chiefs and Community Development Committees on a Memorandum inviting the company back into Ogoni.

In the run up to the first Anniversary of Saro-Wiwa's death, armed soldiers and mobile policeman raided Ogoni communities and detained activists. They were also told to arrest church ministers that mention Ken Saro-Wiwa's name. Thousands of Ogoni defied heavy military presence to hold remembrance church services at designated locations. Women were raped at Saro-Wiwa's home town and protestors shot.

Also in the run up to the Anniversary, Shell paid for a number of journalists to visit the Niger Delta. After the international condemnation and adverse publicly of the year before, Shell wanted to regain some of the PR initiative. So it flew journalists to the Delta to put its side of the story. It was not long before articles started appearing in the international press, dismissing the claims of the Ogoni and various human rights and environmental organisations. One journalist was Richard D. North, who has made a living out of attacking environmental activists, and whose HYPERLINK "http://www.richarddnorth.com/journalism/globalization/nigeria.htm" \t "_blank" article in The Independent newspaper also accused Saro-Wiwa of incitement to murder. In response Saro-Wiwa’s son, Ken Wiwa wrote: "I resent the spin put on the piece. Surely, as the title of your paper suggests, journalists are instructed to form an opinion without undue influence by interested parties. Yet Mr. North flew in Shell helicopters and was shown around by the company".

In January 1997, over 80,000 Ogonis celebrated Ogoni Day in spite of the increased repression. Four people received gun shot wounds whilst 20 people were arrested, tortured and detained. According to MOSOP: "in recent months since the anniversary of the judicial murder of, ...Ken Saro-Wiwa, ...a frightening wave of state terrorism has been unleashed on the area with the deployment of over 2000 armed soldiers. ...Ogoni stands in the threshold of complete extinction".

The World Council of Churches issued a report confirming the dire situation in the Delta: "A quiet state of siege prevails even today in Ogoniland. Intimidation, rape, arrests, torture, shooting and looting by the soldiers continue to occur."

Through 1996–1998 other ethnic groups mainly Ijaw, were in violent confrontations with Shell, Chevron and Texaco, resulting in the deaths of some 200 people and causing estimated damage worth some $50 million. Increasingly protestors were forced to occupy off-shore drilling rigs. The magazine of Environmental Rights Action (Friends of the Earth Nigeria) reported in 1998 that, "it has come to light that Chevron played a major role in the killing of two Delta activists earlier this year. The corporation facilitated an attack by the feared Nigerian navy and notorious Mobile Police on a group of villagers who had occupied one of Chevron’s off-shore drilling facilities."

In September 1998, 20 Ogoni who had been imprisoned since May 1994 on the same charges as Saro-Wiwa were finally released, when all charges against them were dropped. Amnesty International had reported how the 'Ogoni 20' had suffered from ill-treatment, torture, and denied access to lawyers and families. One of them, Clement Tusima, died in detention due to medical neglect, another had gone blind through torture.

Two months later, in November 1998, Shell issued a four-year "Ogoni Workplan", including inspection and repairing of facilities, as well as provisions for "new oil". The following month, the neighbouring Ijaw tribe adopted the 'Kaiama Declaration', which demanded an end to oil production. "We are tired of gas flaring, oil spillages, blowouts and being labelled saboteurs and terrorists", said the declaration. The military crackdown against the Ijaw was both predictable and brutal. There were deaths of, "possibly over 200 people; the torture and inhuman treatment of others; and the arbitrary detention of many more", recorded Human Rights Watch. Girls as young as 12 were raped or tortured.

In 1999, Human Rights Watch issued a major report HYPERLINK "http://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/nigeria/" \t "_blank" The Price of Oil examining the human rights violations in the Delta. Whilst recognising the increasing threat to oil company facilities from protestors, including the use of hostage taking, the report noted that "the oil companies share a responsibility to oppose human rights violations by government forces in the areas in which they operate".

In March 1999, US Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich and several members of Congress called for a congressional investigation into the killings of civilians, human rights abuses and harassment of by the Nigerian security forces with the help of Chevron. Six months later, human rights groups filed a suit against Chevron in the US for summary execution, torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, violation of the rights to life, liberty and security of person and of peaceful assembly and association, consistent pattern of gross violations of human rights, wrongful death, battery, assault, civil conspiracy, and unfair business practices.

Civilian rule was restored in Nigeria in 1999. But if the Niger Delta communities thought that the ending of military rule would bring stability and the withdrawal of the military from the Delta they were wrong. The abuses continued. As the fourth Anniversary of Saro-Wiwa’s death approached, the Nigerian military destroyed Odi, a town of 15,000 in Ijawland in November 1999, demolishing every building, except the bank, the church and the health centre. As many as 2000 people were killed. Human Rights Watch called on the government to withdraw its troops from the Delta.

In January 2000, a report by US NGOs Essential Action and Global Exchange who had toured the Delta concluded "that oil extraction and the related operations of multinational oil corporations pose a serious threat to the livelihood of the people of the Niger Delta".

In April 2000 there was a symbolic burial for Saro-Wiwa after the authorities blocked the release of his remains. Placed in his coffin were two of his favourite novels and his pipe, requests that he had made in his will. Over 100,000 Ogonis attended ceremonies in the week-long events to mark the occasion. In October, according to the Ijaw National Congress, 10 activists were killed protesting against the Italian oil company, Agip.

Early the following year, in 2001, the Niger Delta Development Commission began operating. The commission had been set up by President Obasanjo in response to community demands for greater ownership of oil resources, but its formation did not stop the violence . Nor did it change the behaviour of the oil companies. In October 2002, the commissioner for the environment in Bayelsa State in the Delta told Human Rights Watch that: "The situation of Shell is abysmal. It has not changed and we do not believe there is a possibility of change … As far as relations with communities are concerned we have not seen any changes at all. The flow stations are protected by armed soldiers, they don't give any employment to the youth. As commissioner of the environment I have not seen any changes in corporate philosophy".

Six months later, in April 2003, Human Rights Watch wrote to Shell and other oil companies expressing their, "concern regarding recent violent clashes in Nigeria's Niger delta … since March 13, 2003, clashes around Warri have resulted in the deaths of scores of people and the destruction of dozens of villages." The groups called on the Nigerian government and oil companies to take immediate measures to prevent further violence and abuses around Warri, where scores of people had been killed . However over the next couple of months, hundreds were killed, thousands displaced, and hundreds of homes destroyed.

The violence continued through 2003 and 2004. In December 2003, a report by WAC, consultants to Shell on "Peace and Security in the Niger Delta" was leaked. The report argued that it was clear that Shell was "part of Niger Delta conflict dynamics and that its social license to operate is fast eroding." Its conclusion was alarming: "If current conflict trends continue uninterrupted, it would be surprising if SCIN [Shell companies in Nigeria] is able to continue on-shore resource extraction in the Niger Delta beyond 2008, whilst complying with Shell Business Principles".

In January 2004 Shell’s record in the Delta once again came under scrutiny when a report was published by Christian Aid that looked into claims of Shell’s corporate social responsibility: "Shell claims that it has turned over a new leaf in Nigeria and strives to be a 'good neighbour'. Yet it still fails to quickly clean up oil spills that ruin villages and runs 'community development' projects that are frequently ineffective and which sometimes divide communities living around oilfields …Just as in 1995 and before, Shell presides over a situation in which the violence in the communities around the oilfields, exacerbated by cash payments made by the company, is spiraling out of control".

In 2004 another factor helped escalate the violence; the fight of two rival groups for control of the lucrative oil bunkering trade, whereby oil is siphoned off the large networks of pipelines and sold illegally. In September 2004, Alhaji Dokubo Asari, the leader of one of the groups, the Niger Delta People’s Volunteer Force threatened to launch an all out war in the Delta, sending shock waves through the international oil industry. A hastily arranged peace deal was arranged by President Obasanjo calling for the "disbandement of all militias and militant groups".

Also that month, the Financial Times reported how Shell was "unable to shake off troubled Ogoni legacy" as a dispute over a pipeline deepened. The paper reported how "inappropriate" payments had been made to a local chief by a contractor working for Shell cleaning up an oil spill in Ogoni.

The violence comes right up to date. In February 2005, Human Rights Watch argued that companies such as Shell could be doing more to stop the violence in the Niger Delta. Also that month, the Ijaw, another tribe in the Delta, accused Shell of escalating the violence which led to up to 100 people being killed by the military at the town of Odioma.

Just days before the launch of the Remember Saro-Wiwa project, six people were feared dead after an inter-community clash that had been sparked by an anti-Shell demonstration. Anti-riot police and soldiers had also been called in by Shell. One of the communities told the Nigerian press that: "They wanted to engage Shell and the government in discussion as to how certain issues concerning environmental devastation, the loss of their means of livelihood could be solved. They also wanted to request for the provision of basic amenities like potable drinking water, electricity and all that but instead of addressing this, Shell invited the military".