US embassy cable - 03LAGOS2399

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 LAGOS 002399 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
LONDON AND PARIS FOR AFRICA WATCHERS 
 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/14/2008 
TAGS: PGOV, PREL, KDEM, NI 
SUBJECT: NATIONS WITHIN A NATION: A VISIT TO EDO AND ONDO 
STATES 
 
 
Classified By: CONSUL GENERAL ROBYN HINSON-JONES FOR REASONS 1.5 (B) AN 
 
 
D (D). 
 
 
1. (U) Summary. The impact of the ethnic diversity of 
Nigeria's close to 400 distinct ethnic groups on the 
country's politics and developing democracy was made clearer 
in a recent  visit to Edo and Ondo States.  Ondo State, is 
older by decades than its neighbor Edo and has regional 
governing experience.  It has gotten off to a good start 
under a newly elected administration that has plans to 
significantly increase agricultural production and lure back 
teachers.  By contrast, Edo State is only twelve years old. 
Although almost 100 per cent ethnic Edo, the new governor's 
election is still being challenged and he may yet lose his 
seat.  Edo has joined a recently formed group with the other 
Nigerian ethnic minorities and the group has indicated it 
will support the presidential aspirations of former military 
leader, Ibrahim Babangida.  Tony Anenih, former Minister, 
close advisor of President Obasanjo, and prominent son of Edo 
is still deeply and passionately involved in the State's 
politics and is maneuvering to get his son into the 
governor's chair in the 2007 elections. End summary. 
 
 
Background 
 
 
2. (U) Although most observers admit that Nigerian politics, 
tradition, history and culture are dominated by three major 
ethnic groups, Hausa-Fulani, Yoruba, and Igbo, a recent study 
concludes that there are at least 389 distinct, indigenous 
ethnic groups in Nigeria.  As the nation moves toward 
democratic government, these groups are demanding more 
recognition and more control over their own affairs.  In the 
last elections, the predominantly-Yoruba and southwestern 
Alliance for Democracy (AD) party made an obvious 
ethnocentric move and declined to field a candidate against 
the Yoruba incumbent presidential candidate of the ruling 
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).  Igbos in the southeast 
openly demanded that the Presidency should go to an ethnic 
Igbo.  A former Hausa military ruler from the mostly Muslim 
north publicly and privately urged Muslims to vote Muslim -- 
which would almost guarantee a Hausa President.  Looking to 
the 2007 elections, a group claiming to represent the other 
386 ethnic groups was formed this month in the capital Abuja. 
 The group, the Ethnic Minorities Movement of Nigeria (EMMN), 
adds another layer of unpredictability to the traditional 
Nigerian political struggle to form winning alliances among 
the southeast, southwest and the north, and EMMN has, at 
least initially, vowed to support a Hausa -- Ibrahim 
Babangida.  Ondo and Edo States are a microcosm of the ethnic 
diversity that is the problem and promise of Nigeria's past, 
present and, possibly, its future. 
 
 
Edo and Ondo 
 
 
3. (U) Edo and Ondo share a common border and are similar in 
some ways.  They are both southwestern States, with similar 
topography, bad roads and crumbling infrastructure.  Both 
claim to have the best educated populations with the highest 
number of PhDs and university professors.  Before  the 
development of the oil industry, the economies of both States 
were based on agriculture and forestry.  The differences 
between the two are, however, more striking.  Ondo has been a 
defined and recognized province, territory or State in 
Nigeria since 1915.  Its population of about 5 million is 
almost entirely Yoruba.  Ondo's southern border is coastline 
along the Bight of Benin and also includes a small part of a 
lower corner of the Niger River Delta.  This access to the 
sea allows a small fishing industry to operate, but, 
unfortunately, Ondo has no on- or off-shore oil.  Edo became 
a State only in 1991.  Its approximately 3 million residents 
are ethnic Edo who trace their roots back many centuries to 
the ancient Kingdom of Bini.  These people speak the Edo 
language and do not claim to be a sub-group of any other 
ethnic group.  Edo is poor in resources and landlocked. 
However, Benin City, where the internationally renowned 
ancient Benin Bronzes were created, is the capital of Edo and 
it draws a modest amount of visitors to the State. 
 
 
New administration in Ondo is off to a fast start 
 
 
4.  (U) PolOffs met with Ondo Speaker of the House of 
Assembly Victor A. Olabimtan on a one day familiarization 
visit to the State.  Ondo, like four of its neighboring 
States to the west, abandoned the AD and elected the full 
slate of PDP candidates, headed by Governor Chief Segun 
Agagu.  Olabimtan was eager to tell us what the new 
administration had accomplished in less than six months in 
office.  He started his prepared remarks by saying that Ondo 
is a "peaceful" State with the most highly educated 
population in the country.  "We don't fight; we reason our 
way to solutions to our problems," he boasted.  He said the 
Agagu administration is concentrating  on the revival of the 
agricultural sector in Ondo, especially the production of 
cocoa.  The State has already hired consultants to study ways 
to increase rice production that used to be produced in the 
State in export level quantities.  Ondo is also launching 
several programs to lure people back to the agriculture-based 
rural towns.  Teachers who agree to work in these places will 
be given "bush bonuses" and even cars; people willing to farm 
in the areas will receive no-interest, "community-based" 
loans and equipment.  Development of bitumen mining is being 
pursued as another source of revenue and jobs for the State. 
The Speaker said that Ondo has the largest deposits of 
bitumen and that two companies, one Nigerian (Beecon) and the 
other Canadian (Naisan), have already received approval from 
the GON to start work. 
 
 
No more "khaki boys" 
 
 
5. (U) Turning to politics, Olabimtan thanked the USG for 
supporting Nigeria and for "helping us to stabilize our 
democracy."  He continued, saying "Democracy has come to 
stay.  We will have no more 'khaki boy' rulers!"  He 
expressed great interest in US visitor exchange programs for 
legislators and government administrators.  However, all is 
not sweetness and light in Ondo.  The State is having some of 
the same problems as several other States with challenges and 
protests from the losing parties in the 2003 elections.  The 
Ondo State chapter of the AD, calling the Agagu 
administration one of "fiction, falsehood and visonless 
government," has challenged the Governor to tell voters why 
he has fired 30% of the civil servants appointed by the 
previous (AD) Governor and why it has not yet paid months of 
back pay to teachers.  Olabimtan said that the new 
administration had inherited financial and personnel problems 
from the previous government. 
 
 
Edo State motto: "The heartbeat of the nation" 
 
 
6. (U) Benin City, the capital of Edo State, looks no better 
nor worse than any other major Nigerian city with its bad 
roads, busy and crowded markets and streets, but it does have 
an entire street in the heart of the downtown area for makers 
and sellers of bronze and brass.  We met with Dr. Osagie 
Obayuwana, who is a lawyer and the gubernatorial candidate of 
the National Conscience Party (NCP) in the 2003 elections, 
and Esosa Edosomwan, a professor of economics and NCP State 
Chairman.  Obayuwana, who received his law degree from 
Michigan State, claimed his party was the only credible 
opposition to the ruling PDP in Edo State. "We are the party 
of revolutionaries," he declared.  He touched on a theme we 
have heard from political activists in other parts of the 
south, that Nigeria needs to overhaul its 1999 Constitution 
by calling a Sovereign National Conference.  "Once the people 
have spoken (by referendum on a new Constitution) we can 
mobilize and move forward," he said.  According to Obayuwana, 
until the Constitution is amended to conform to the wishes of 
the people for more control and "true federalism", Nigeria's 
new democracy is unstable.  Edosomwan observed that the NCP 
was the party of liberals, progressives and welfarists.  He 
said pessimistically, "Most Nigerians are ignorant of how 
government should work.  The NCP wants to energize the people 
because we can not keep waiting for our so-called leaders to 
change or to make changes."  Edosomwan said the NCP has a 
political enlightenment and education program that it plans 
to roll out in all of Nigeria after the new year -- if it can 
find funding.  He said that the Party was already working 
with some US organizations, notably the US Congressional 
Black Caucus, and was trying to get more help from 
Nigerian-Americans and other Nigerians in the diaspora. 
 
 
Anenih - The Fixer 
 
 
7. (U) Edo also has a continuing political imbroglio.  Tony 
Anenih, former Minister of Works and Housing, confidant of 
President Olusegun Obasanjo and nicknamed "the Fixer" by his 
political colleagues for his ability to work behind the 
scenes for Obasanjo, is also the longtime political 
"godfather" in Edo State.  Anenih and Chief Gabriel 
Igbinedion (father of the second term PDP Governor, Lucky 
Igbinedion) have been battling for control of politics in Edo 
since the State was created.  Matters heated up in October 
when the Igbinedion forces in the State Assembly impeached 
the Speaker of the House,  Friday Itulah, one of Anenih's 
godsons.  The media have reported that the fight is about who 
will be governor of Edo in 2007.  Anenih is said to be 
setting up the machinery and grooming one of his sons to get 
the position.  Igbinedion is said to prefer somebody else -- 
anybody else -- for the position.  Charges of duplicity and 
allegations of fraud, coercion, and favoritism have been 
flying among the two sides and various factions of the Edo 
group since the impeachment, but no one has taken any legal 
action.  The voters of Edo have four years to decide whether 
Anehih gets to keep his "godfather" title. 
 
 
Environmental rights are human rights 
 
 
8. (U) PolOffs had just time in a one day familiarization 
visit to meet with Godwin Uyi Ojo, Programmes Director for 
Environmental Rights Action/ Friends of the Earth, Nigeria 
(ERA).  ERA was formed in 1993 as an organization dedicated 
to the principle that "All people shall have the right to a 
generally satisfactory environment favorable to their 
development."  The group now has offices in Benin, Bayelsa, 
Lagos and Port Harcourt.  The group is funded by 
contributions from private citizens in Nigeria and some 
foreign contributions.  It gets no funds from the GON.  Ojo 
is a political ecologist with degrees in environment and 
development, and social studies from England and the 
Netherlands.  He has a weekly environmental column in the 
Guardian newspaper and is the author of several books of 
poetry on the environmental struggle in Nigeria.  Ojo said 
ERA does not support a particular party but would support a 
party that was effective in furthering the goals of the 
group.  He said the group is not positive on the PDP's grasp 
of environmental issues and its apparent "military mindset." 
As an example he cited that President Obasanjo had banned gas 
flaring in 1979.  Nothing was done up until 2002 when he 
banned it, again.  Suddenly, in 2003, all the oil and gas 
companies announced a 51 per cent reduction in flaring -- 
without any verifiable data to prove the reduction. 
 
 
9. (C)  ERA currently has a team of international 
environmental law specialists reviewing Nigeria's 
environmental laws and drafting a proposed new law that will 
focus on the human rights issue of a peoples' right to 
control their natural resources.  In addition, they are 
following closely the development of tin mining in Jos and 
Edo States so that "Mistakes that were made in the Delta (oil 
region) will not be made again."  Ojo said his organization 
supports the calls for a Sovereign National Conference 
because the 1999 Constitution does not protect peoples' right 
to control their resources.  He added that the organization 
will lobby and press for national legislation that will 
assure the people are represented in all future environmental 
projects.  Lastly, he told us he was sad to see that the US 
had given an award to Chevron, a company that, he said, "had 
hired military gunboats to kill people." 
 
 
10. (C)  Comment.  Not much has changed in the southwest 
since the April and May elections.  Even some of the names of 
the players are the same.  It is a hopeful sign, however, 
that though many thought the last elections were rife with 
fraud and they are being doggedly challenged in the Elections 
Tribunals, for the most part Nigeria got through the 
elections without the violence or military intervention that 
had marred previous elections, and both winners and losers 
are actively preparing and positioning for the next round in 
2007. 
HINSON-JONES