MOSOP 'Ogoni Day' Press Release

MOVEMENT FOR THE SURVIVAL OF THE OGONI PEOPLE
(MOSOP)
Suite 5, 3-4 Albion Place, Galena Rd, London W6 0LT
Tel: 0181! 563 8614 Fax: 0181! 563 X615

PRESS RELEASE - 4th January 1997 - PRESS RELEASE

OGONI MUST SURVIVE

Today, we mark the Ogoni Day as an indigenous people in Nigeria. Four years ago, 300,000 Ogonis demonstrated their faith in nonviolence and passive resistance through a landmark peaceful protest to give practical expression to their struggle for environmental and social justice. The plight of the Ogonis since then however has been extrajudicial, killings, repression illegal detentions and torture. In the recent months since the anniversary of the judicial murder of the late Ogoni leader, Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight others, a frightening wave of state terrorism has been unleashed on the area with the deployment of over 2000 armed soldiers.

Today, Ogoni stands on the threshold of complete extinction and remains marginalised as shown by the recent local government creation by which Tai kingdom was consigned into another ethnic group. This is complemented by Shell's payment of "field allowances" to the military whose operations in Ogoni has forced thousands of Ogonis into exile as political refugees.

MOSOP therefore implores all people of goodwill the world over to re-commit themselves to the Ogoni struggle by adopting a global consumer-boycott of Nigerian oil and Shell products. MOSOP while commending the support of the international community and most Western countries insist that an important benchmark in assessing Nigerian's human rights record and genuine democratic arrangements would be

the immediate release of the Ogoni 19 and all other political detainees;
withdrawal of all troops from and restoration of basic freedoms in Ogoni and Nigeria as a whole; and implementation of the UN Mission report on Nigeria pursuant to the December, 1996 resolution of the UN General Assembly.

For further information, please contact the above numbers.