Why pardon for Saro-Wiwa, other Ogoni leaders isn’t best option – Nnimmo Bassey

A renowned environmental activist, Nnimmo Bassey, has dismissed as not being the best option, President Bola Tinubu’s plan to grant state pardon to Ken Saro-Wiwa and other eight Ogoni leaders executed in 1995 by Nigerian military dictator, Sani Abacha, because of their struggle for environmental justice for their oil-rich community in the Niger Delta region.

Mr Tinubu, during his address at the joint session of the National Assembly on Thursday, 12 June, to mark Nigeria’s 2025 Democracy Day, conferred posthumous national honours on Mr Saro-Wiwa (CON) and the others – Saturday Dobee (OON), Nordu Eawo (OON), Daniel Gbooko (OON), Paul Levera (OON), Felix Nuate (OON), Baribor Bera (OON), Barinem Kiobel (OON), and John Kpuine (OON).

He hinted that his administration would give a state pardon to the late Ogoni leaders.

“I shall also be exercising my powers under the prerogative of mercy to grant these national heroes a full pardon, together with others whose names shall be announced later in conjunction with the National Council of State,” the president stated in his address.

In his reaction to Mr Tinubu’s remark, Mr Bassey, the director of Health of Mother Earth Foundation, re-stated his long-held view that the Nigerian government must exonerate the Ogoni Nine of the crimes for which they were accused, instead of considering a pardon.

“A mere pardon at this time appears to be aimed at reopening the oil wells in Ogoniland — a step that would mean dancing on the graves of the murdered leaders. Exoneration is the political action we demand of the government to bring a closure to the environmental genocide and other crimes committed against the Ogoni people,” Mr Bassey told PREMIUM TIMES, Friday, a day after the president’s remark.

“The government that executed Ken Saro-Wiwa and the eight Ogoni leaders was an illegitimate military junta and the trial itself was clearly a rigged process. The leaders were executed within the appeal period. That confirmed the aberrant nature of the process. Considering the enormity of the injustice against the heroes, the only step that would partially settle the injustice suffered is a clear exoneration of the martyrs,” he added.

On the national honours conferred on the Ogoni Nine, Mr Bassey said, “Ken Saro-Wiwa and the others deserve to be honoured. But coming at a time when the government is desperate to jack up oil production, while pollution continues unabated, the move is ill-timed.”

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Previous rejection of pardon

In 2021, Mr Bassey and leaders of 10 other civil society organisations issued a statement rejecting a similar plan for state pardon for Mr Saro-Wiwa and others by the then-President Muhammadu Buhari.

The Ken Saro-Wiwa Foundation had also rejected Mr Buhari’s plan for pardon.

“His death remains a matter that is yet to be resolved because the state necessarily has to exonerate him of the false charges and the kind of kangaroo judgment that was given by that tribunal.

“Besides, the state has to apologise to the victims and to the Ogoni people for executing them when the appeal period had not even elapsed,” Mr Bassey said in a 2018 interview with PREMIUM TIMES.

Mr Bassey said 10 November, the day the Ogoni Nine were executed, has always been a day for sober reflection for him.

“The day he was executed in 1995, I was at that time the secretary-general of the Association of Nigerian Authors.

“We were having our annual conference at the University of Lagos, and we were debating whether to issue a statement pleading with Abacha to have mercy and cancel the death sentence or to issue a hard-line statement condemning the atrocities of his dictatorship. Why that debate was going on, we got the news that they had been executed.

“So, it is always a very sad day for me.

READ ALSO: Tinubu honours Saro-Wiwa, other Ogoni leaders executed by Abacha

“The campaign of Ken Saro-Wiwa was focused on environmental justice. And the injustice meted out on him and the Ogoni people is one of the major reasons I have made environmental justice campaign my lifetime cause.”

Accused of being responsible for the murder of four Ogoni chiefs at a pro-government meeting, Mr Saro-Wiwa and the others were sentenced to death by hanging by a special military tribunal.

Several Nigerians believe Mr Saro-Wiwa and the others were framed up for the murder because of their very impactful non-violent campaign against oil extraction and the continuous degradation of the Ogoniland by the government-backed multi-national oil companies, especially the Royal Dutch Shell.