US embassy cable - 03ABUJA1909

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ABUJA 001909 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/02/2013 
TAGS: PGOV, PHUM, NI 
SUBJECT: NIGERIA: NO POLITICAL SETTLEMENT IN WARRI YET 
 
 
REF: ABUJA 1234 
 
 
Classified by Political Counselor James Maxstadt for reasons 
1.5 (b) and (d). 
 
 
1. (C) Summary:  While sporadic fighting among the Ijaw, 
Uhrobo and Itsekiri continues in the creeks of Warri, the 
debate is intensifying among Nigerians over how to resolve 
political grievances underlying the Warri crisis.  Ijaw and 
Itsekiri leaders -- each backing rival policies -- are 
putting pressure on President Obasanjo to settle the debate 
in their favor or face greater instability in the Warri area. 
 End Summary 
 
 
2. (C) The 2003 rounds of fighting in Warri, part of a 
recurring conflict almost 10 years old, is largely over 
resource control -- the establishment of local rights over 
prime oil producing territory, and deciding just who is 
"local."  Itsekiris see themselves as the hereditary 
"landlords" of the Warri kingdom and the Ijaws as "tenants" 
who arrived in the area recently (the past century) and are 
encroaching on Itsekiri turf.  The Ijaws of Warri, three of 
over 20 Ijaw clans in Nigeria, feel they are the politically 
marginalized majority denied their fair share of the 
lucrative royalties from oil produced in their home areas. 
 
 
3. (C) The resource control fight is defined in terms of 
political representation, specifically the local government 
areas (LGAs) dominated by each group and the division of 
electoral wards within those LGAs.  Itsekiri have long 
controlled the area now encompassed by the three LGAs of 
Warri -- Warri North, Warri South, and Warri Southwest. 
Chairmen of these local governments have been Itsekiri, as 
have most of the Commissioners in these local governments. 
In practical terms, this means that federal funds allocated 
to the three Warri LGAs are largely disbursed for the benefit 
of Itsekiri residents.  Ijaws are the majority outside the 
three Warri LGAs, and feel they are now the majority in Warri 
Southwest and a sizable, yet unrepresented population in the 
other two LGAs.  The Itsekiri feel they ceded other areas 
near Warri (e.g. Sapele LGA) to Ijaw and Uhrobo populations 
that are now trying to crowd them from the three Warri LGAs 
-- one step away from losing everything. 
 
 
FOUR SPUTTERING RESOLUTION EFFORTS -- Danjuma Report 
--------------------------------------------- ------- 
 
 
4. (C) Created by President Obasanjo as a Committee Chaired 
by then-Defense Minister Theophilus Danjuma, the Warri Crisis 
Committee continued under Danjuma's leadership after the 
April 2003 elections.  Danjuma summoned delegations of elders 
from the three warring factions -- Uhrobo, Itsekiri and Ijaw 
-- to Abuja or to the Delta State capital of Asaba.  Numerous 
participating representatives from the three groups tell us 
that the limited number of full Committee meetings were 
characterized by highly polarized recitations of each group's 
position or demands.  By the end of August, Danjuma had 
drafted and submitted a report to Obasanjo on the Committee's 
deliberations, though he did not share this draft with the 
committee's ethnic-representative participants.  The report, 
while cited often, has yet to be distributed outside the 
Presidential Villa.  Comments from sources close to the 
President and the Danjuma Committee's work, however, suggest 
the report contains little in the way of detailed proposals 
to resolve the issues. 
 
 
The Delta State Government "Road Map" 
------------------------------------- 
 
 
5. (C) Delta State Governor Chief James Ibori  spent 
significant time in dialogue with the warring factions from 
April 2003.  With great fanfare, in May Ibori moved his 
office from the State capital (Asaba) to Warri, and pledged 
he would remain in Warri until a viable peace plan had been 
forged.  After several weeks of traveling in June and July 
through the Warri communities affected by the fighting, Ibori 
began speaking of a "Road Map for Peace in Warri."  This plan 
is grounded on the assumption that the warring parties have 
gone beyond the point of return to their previous, peaceful 
coexistence, and therefore calls for new LGAs or District 
Councils (the local administrative unit seen during the 
military years) delineated along ethnic lines to be created 
out of the existing three Warri LGAs.  While this would give 
Ijaws heretofore unseen political representation in Warri 
(separate from the many LGAs controlled by Ijaws outside of 
Warri), it would further diminish the political turf of the 
micro-minority Itsekiri who currently dominate only three 
LGAs in all of Nigeria. 
 
 
Obasanjo's Intervention 
----------------------- 
 
 
6. (C) Ibori's road map was dealt a severe blow on September 
9, when Obasanjo visited Warri and met with leaders of the 
three ethnic groups in Effurun, outside Warri town.  During 
that meeting, the President strongly urged the warring groups 
to pursue "accommodation" of each other's interests and 
demands as the way to achieve peace in the area.  Obasanjo 
heaped scorn on proposals to re-divide the area into more new 
local government areas (LGAs), saying that such division 
would only accentuate differences and further fuel the 
crisis.  This public criticism was widely interpreted as 
targeting Governor Ibori, who has drawn President Obasanjo's 
ire in the past.  The Itsekiri were the only party to applaud 
the President's stance, and Obasanjo has not provided a 
concrete political plan of actions to take instead of 
creating new LGAs. 
 
 
Military Threats 
---------------- 
 
 
7. (C) Ijaw leaders responded viscerally to President 
Obasanjo's rejection of new LGAs, threatening renewed 
violence in the region.  At Obasanjo's September 9 meeting 
with the ethnic leaders, Ijaw Chief Mamamu -- who was 
standing in for Chief E.K. Clark -- told the President 
directly that the Ijaw would return to violence if their 
demands for new LGAs were not met.  Ijaw youth groups, 
including the FNDIC militants, have echoed this threat in 
recent discussions with Mission officers traveling to the 
Warri area.  In a November 1 phone conversation with CRO, 
Clark confirmed the accuracy of October 30 press reports of 
the Ijaw leader's open criticism of Obasanjo.  Clark, who 
returned to Warri October 29 after two months of medical 
leave in the U.K., stated that the President must not be 
allowed to block the creation of new ethnically-defined LGAs. 
 
 
8. (C) Although upwards of four battalions of Nigerian 
military have been deployed to the Delta for some months to 
deal with such threats, thus far the military has stuck to 
its bases.  Essentially the Nigerian military has not ended 
either the threat or the capacity for violence by the Ijaws, 
nor have the Ijaws been able to gain their demands. 
 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
 
9. (C) Obasanjo's appeal for "accommodation" among the three 
feuding groups rings hollow in light of federal development 
assistance to Warri not increasing on the ground, and federal 
security personnel not being able to date to restore law and 
order across the Delta.  Governor Ibori's plan to divide 
Warri into ethnically-delineated LGAs seems to be the only 
political solution on the table.  Ibori's return from Warri 
to Asaba reflects his unhappiness with Obasanjo; 
nevertheless, Ibori will likely push his "Road Map" through 
the Delta State Assembly (which he controls) and maybe 
through the National Assembly in Abuja.  Obasanjo may not 
like the uninspiring report from Danjuma, but he has not put 
out any other political alternative in his effort to block 
Ibori from dividing Warri into ethnic enclaves.  The military 
alternative has not succeeded yet, for Obasanjo or for the 
Ijaws.  While no political solution to Warri's problems can 
end the fighting absolutely, not having a political solution 
absolutely guarantees continued instability in this oil-rich 
swamp. 
MEECE