‘Oil is the poison: Action is the antidote’ – sixteen days in the movement to end fossil fuels
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Apr 22, 2022
At 8.25 on Friday 15th April, as the rush hour traffic poured off the M4 at Chiswick, four activists stepped out in front of an Eddie Stobart oil tanker. Two held up a banner declaring ‘Just Stop Oil’ whilst two others disabled the braking system and clambered up onto the back of the tanker. Passing...
The Open Wound – keeping eyes on the constant injustice of oil production in Nigeria
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Nov 9, 2021
26th Anniversary of the murder of Ken Saro-Wiwa and 8 Ogoni comrades Authored by James Marriott of Platform drawing from the collective experience of so many others in Platform and the multiple organisations we’ve collaborated with. On the morning of 10th November 1995 in a Port Harcourt goal, Nigeria were murdered: Ken...
Profiting from the Panic – how to use a squeeze in the oil flow to financial advantage
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Oct 4, 2021
Petrol Panic grips the nation. A second week of fuel shortages on the forecourts threatens to hobble the economy, or at least erode support for the Tories in their heartlands and overshadow the Conservative Party Conference. Will queues at the petrol pumps in Manchester crowd the prime minister’s show? The Shell stations in Bolton were...
Of Turmeric and Truth – ‘Fuel for Thought’ and the struggle in Ogoni
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Jun 12, 2019
This blog is co-authored by Andy Rowell (Oil Change International) and James Marriott (Platform) Lazarus Tamana, Europe Coordinator of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), holds up a small round plastic container, an inch deep, two inches across. It is filled with a rich yellow-ochre coloured powder. “This was grown...
Breaking: The Struggle to Free the Bus: The Twists, the Turns and the Conspiracies
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Feb 24, 2016
BREAKING Guest Blog by Ken Henshaw, Social Action, Nigeria The extraordinary behind-the-scenes story of the Bus memorial seizure and the struggle to release it, on the day of the 3rd Hearing to release the memorial to Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni 8. Show your support – follow and tweet @GreatOgoni, @Kenn_Henshaw, @S_DouglasCamp. Support the Movement...
Save the date – Action Saro-Wiwa events
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Jul 30, 2015
2015 is the 20th anniversary of the executions of Nigerian writer Ken Saro-Wiwa and 8 other Ogoni men. They were murdered by the Nigerian military government for protesting against Shell’s devastation of their Niger Delta land, once the breadbasket of Africa. Action Saro-Wiwa is contributing to two events coming up in August to push for justice...
Oil Be Back: could drilling begin again in Ogoniland 22 years after the people kicked Shell out?
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Feb 26, 2015
Recently there has been a flurry of Nigerian media headlines stating that oil drilling in Ogoniland could soon re-start. I have tried to dig deeper to assess what is currently known and what questions remain. Has Shell sold assets in Ogoniland? So far, there have been no news stories outside of Nigeria about Shell’s plans...
‘The Bus’ memorial for Ken Saro-Wiwa is on the move…
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Mar 6, 2014
Today, the Bus moved from Bernie Grant Arts Centre in Tottenham where it has been for three years, round the corner to Hale Village where it will be throughout 2014. The Living Memorial to Ken Saro-Wiwa, aka The Bus, is a spectacular steel sculpture by artist Sokari Douglas Camp. Platform commissioned it in 2005, the...
New law in Nigeria could hold polluters to account
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Feb 18, 2014
Last week, a letter coordinated by Platform and signed by 18 organisations was published in the Nigerian media. The letter focussed on a new piece of legislation designed to improve the response to oil spills. In 2012, Senator Dr. Bukola Saraki, the Chair of the Senate committee for the environment tabled a bill aimed at strengthening...
Ogoni protests escalate in Nigeria as Shell fails to implement UNEP report
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Dec 11, 2013
A few weeks ago we were crammed into a small radio station studio in Port Harcourt. We listened with bated breath to our friend Celestine AkpoBari from the Ogoni Solidarity Forum being interviewed. “There is no going back on the 90 day deadline ultimatum delivered to the Nigerian Government and oil companies to implement the...
Rewriting the future: Achebe, literature, and activism
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Mar 25, 2013
Nigerian write Chinua Achebe died last Thursday at the age of 83. He is a key figure in world literature and a writer who along with others utterly changed the way cultures pre- and post-imperialism – and pre-missionary – imagined representing themselves. In so doing, he bolstered the challenge to western and white supremacist...
Shell on trial – landmark ruling on oil spills due this Wednesday
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Jan 28, 2013
This Wednesday a Dutch court will rule on whether Shell should clean up oil damage that destroyed a group of Nigerian farmers’ land in a landmark case that could lead the way for a spate of similar actions in the future. The farmers, whose land has been destroyed by oil from Shell pipelines, have travelled...
