Mythic Oil Resources Belonging and The Politics of Claim Making Among The Ilaje Yoruba of Nigeria

Africa 83 (2) 2013: 293–313 doi:10.
1017/S0001972013000053
MYTHIC OIL: RESOURCES, BELONGING

AND THE POLITICS OF CLAIM MAKING
AMONG THE ÌLÀJẸ YORÙBÁ OF NIGERIA
Ọmo ̣lade Adunbi
The people of the Niger Delta, as well as those from the Ìlàje1̣ regions of
south-western Nigeria, emerged from agrarian populations that once occupied
the entire Delta region. Until recently, these groups engaged in fish farming, land
cultivation and other agricultural activities. However, with the advent of oil
exploration in 1956, farming activities gave way to oil pipelines, flow stations and
platforms, and thriving agrarian populations fell into decline. Control of agrarian
land and aquatic water by government fiat – first under the British colonial
administration and later under the post-colonial state – resulted in a change from
community ownership to state ownership of resources. This change further
resulted in the widespread marginalization of minorities, violent disputes over the
control of natural resources, and conflicting rights claims to indigeneity, descent
and belonging.
It is within this context that the people of the Niger Delta now refer to
themselves, and are referred to by non-governmental organizations (NGOs),
government entities and multinational corporations, as ‘oil-producing commu-
nities’. In this article, I explore how and why the Ìlàje ̣ people of the Niger Delta
define themselves as oil communities, using techniques of narrative, myth, ritual
and song in ways that inject them into the larger imaginaries that frame the Niger
Delta politics of oil. I examine how narratives of belonging and ownership of
natural resources are reshaping the politics of claim making in many communities
of the Niger Delta, and also how the politics of claim making is reshaping
narratives of belonging. I argue that the claim to ownership of land and oil
resources is not only rooted in the rich history of the Ìlàje ̣ but also stems from the
events of November 1995 when many communities in the Niger Delta, reacting to
the execution of Ken Saro Wiwa by the Nigerian state, began to form associations
and other protest groups to make claim to ownership of oil resources. For the
Ìlàje ̣, I suggest, this process of claim making produced the Parabe protest of 1998
against Chevron Nigeria Limited. The Parabe protest organized by Ìlàje ̣ youth
in consultation with their elders was violently crushed by the Nigerian state,
ỌMỌLADE ADUNBI is a political anthropologist and an Assistant Professor in the Department of

Afroamerican and African Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He received his BA in
Philosophy from Ondo State University, Ado-Ekiti, Nigeria and an MA in African Studies
followed by a PhD in Anthropology from Yale University. His research explores issues related to
resource distribution, governance, human and environmental rights, power, culture, transna-
tional institutions, multinational corporations and the post-colonial state. His current work
focuses on Nigeria and is situated in the oil-rich communities of the Niger Delta region where he
examines the connection between oil wealth and power as it emerges from relations between
transnational capital, civil society organizations, NGOs and members of the local communities.
Email: oadunbi@umich.edu
1
The Ìlàje ̣ are part of the Yorùbá group.
© International African Institute 2013
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

294 ỌMỌLADE ADUNBI
allegedly at the urging of Chevron. The protest lasted three days and attracted the
attention of both local and international media in ways that also spurred the
participation of environmental and human rights groups. The protest led to a
legal challenge against Chevron in a San Francisco court on the propriety of the
use of violence against local oil communities. Thus, I examine how the Parabe
protest was in a way embedded in the Ìlàje ̣ narrative of belonging as well as the
general rhetoric of resource ownership prevalent in the entire Niger Delta.
The core problem is that the oil economy is structured in such a way that
communities located in resource exploitation areas do not derive any of the
benefits. Communities are denied access to their land and experience high
unemployment, and revenues from oil are beyond the reach of most community
members (Barber 1982; Renne 1995; Apter 2005; Smith 2007; Okonta 2008;
Mitchell 2009; Adunbi 2011; Medani 2011). This discrepancy between regional
belonging and national resource control, and the related contestations, took me to
the Ìlàje ̣ area of Western Niger Delta, first in 2005 and later in 2007 for fieldwork
that lasted more than two years.2 I became interested in understanding how
the physical presence of the oil installations – drilling platforms, flow stations,
pipelines – represents a promise of widespread wealth, while at the same time the
realities of resource control exclude local people from the benefits of oil-related
modernity. These exclusions, beginning during the colonial era and continuing in
the post-colonial state, range from land reform, usage laws and zoning restrictions
to militarized formations in the region by the Nigerian army and multinational
corporation security forces intended to protect oil operations. As a result of such
exclusions, many communities, including the Ìlàje ̣, have been involved in political
organizing against multinational corporate control of land and oil in the
Niger Delta.
This article examines the genealogies of the Ìlàje ̣ and how their narrative of
belonging reinforces claims to ownership of land and natural resources such as oil.
The article shows how such narratives are embedded in practices that are
transforming communities rich in natural resources into enclaves of protest in an
attempt to regain what many communities claim belongs to them. The article
maps how the oil installations have come to represent an ancestral promise of
wealth to many members of Ìlàje ̣ communities. This claim making, I suggest, is
embedded in a myth of origin that continuously reinforces a distinct Ìlàje ̣ identity,
projecting an imagined community connected to the Yorùbá of south-west
Nigeria as well as the oil-rich Niger Delta region. While many scholars focus on
the myth of origin of the Yorùbá, in most cases centring their interest on rituals
and a political imagination that intersect with linguistic evidence in determining
group identity (see, for example, Peel 1983; Apter 1992), these scholars have not
explored the centrality of these myths to oil resources. Thus, I investigate how the
Ìlàje ̣ narrative of belonging creates its own specificity of ‘ownership’ of natural
resources through ritual performances connected to migration and dispersal of
subject populations. These ritual performances, I argue, reinforce claims to
ownership of land and natural resources such as oil in ways that project the oil
2
This article draws on extensive fieldwork in many communities of the Niger Delta between
2005 and 2008. During this period, I immersed myself in the communities, conducting interviews
and participating in many daily activities of community members.

MYTHIC OIL AMONG THE ÌLÀJẸ YORÙBÁ 295
installations as the fulfilment of ancestral promises of wealth. I show how the Ìlàje ̣
embed their claims to land ownership and natural resources in practices allegedly
derived from divine knowledge that continuously reinforce processes of remem-
bering and imagination. I suggest that these Ìlàje ̣ narratives and claims shape an
identity that positions Ìlàje ̣ communities as a distinct Yorùbá community inserted
through divine power in the oil-rich Niger Delta. In what follows, based on
interviews and participant observation among community environmental
activists, elders, chiefs, youth and women of Ìlàje ̣,3 I also show that this process
of claim making has transformed Ìlàje ̣ communities into new spaces of protest in
ways that challenge the activities of the Nigerian state and multinational oil
corporations in the region.
MYTH, MIGRATION AND GENEALOGIES OF BELONGING
The Ìlàje ̣ are classified as Yorùbá, but, in recent times, they have begun to dis-
tinguish themselves by claiming to belong to what I call the economic Niger
Delta.4 In this section, I give a brief background to Ìlàje ̣ social organization that
situates the broader analysis. The Ìlàje ̣ can be subdivided into four main entities:
Ugbo,5 Mahin, Aheri and Etikan. All are interconnected and possess a shared
history. The main Ìlàje ̣ occupations are fishing, canoe making, mat making,
farming and trading. The Ìlàje ̣ occupy more than two thirds of the coastal belt in
Ondo State in the south-west and Niger Delta regions of Nigeria, with a southern
border at the Atlantic Ocean.
While the Ìlàje ̣ have a shared history, I focus on the Ugbo Kingdom because it
is the only oil-bearing community in the area. The Ugbo Kingdom is composed of
140 communities spread across several towns and villages (see Figures 1 and 2).
There are sixteen quarters in Ugbo township, each representing a family, which is
why they are referred to as Èjìnédógún (‘Sixteen’) in the local dialect. Senior chiefs
(Dosun) constitute the Olugbo-in-Council, the highest decision-making body of
the kingdom, which is presided over by the king. These Ugbo communities view
the Atlantic Ocean as significant both for its role as a source of income and also as
an omen of one of the most important rituals of the Ìlàje ̣. The Atlantic Ocean and
other adjoining rivers host many oil platforms, wells, and stations located
offshore.
Thus, I build upon the important scholarly work on ritual and political
imagination among the Yorùbá (Bascom 1969; Atanda 1980; Olupo ̣na 1991;
Apter 1992; Clarke 2004) by relating it to a novel area of inquiry: how ritual
performances and myths of dispersal and belonging are being mobilized to project
3
In all, over 100 interviews were conducted during the period of my stay in the area.
4
I call the Ìlàje ̣ part of the ‘economic Niger Delta’ because they are not considered to be part of
what is geographically and politically known as the Niger Delta. However, because they are
considered oil-producing, they become part of the Niger Delta. Interestingly, the Niger Delta is
today being included in a new geographical category ‘south-south’ which encompasses some
areas that were not in the Niger Delta region.
5
I focus most on the Ugbo Kingdom. Some of my observations also apply to other Ìlàje ̣
communities.

FIGURE 1 An aerial view of one of the sixteen quarters (Èjìnédógún) of

Ugbo township
FIGURE 2 Canoe petrol station
a distinct identity connected to natural resources, particularly oil. My point of

departure is to examine ways in which these rituals and myths of origin are being
mobilized by different actors within the Ìlàje ̣ community to make political claims

to ownership of oil resources. Where and how do migration and dispersal

interconnect and interrelate with notions of an ancestral promise of wealth? How
and why did those notions become an important rhetoric in mobilizing against
multinational corporation control of oil resources? Investigating Ìlàje ̣ cosmology
and migration history helps to shape understanding of how the discovery of oil
in Ìlàje ̣ in particular and the Niger Delta in general continues to structure notions
of belonging, protest, governance and ‘ownership’ of land and natural resources
in Nigeria.
IMAGINING THE ‘WEALTHLAND’: MYTH, MEMORY,

AND DIVINE POWER
The Ugbo people consider themselves to be the ‘original’ inhabitants of Ilé-Ife` ̣

(better known as Ife` ̣ today) who were driven out as a result of an interplay of
power, political manipulation and family disputes. The Ugbo interpret their loss
of Ilé-Ife` ̣ as divinely ordered because their ancestors had promised an abundance
of wealth. It is the realization of this divine promise by their ancestors that made
the Ugbo embark on a journey in search of a particular ‘sign’ that promises and
manifests wealth. As many community members told me, this particular ‘sign’
revealed itself when they migrated to what is today known as the Ugbo Kingdom.
The Atlantic Ocean, huge oil reserves and other natural resources in this region
today represent the manifestation of this sign. This section maps the Ugbo
narrative of a divinely ordained journey from Ilé-Ife` ̣ to the present location of the
Ìlàje ̣ people. I examine how this ‘sign’ of wealth manifested itself, who led the
Ugbo to their present location, and how this myth translates into a form of
memory and divine knowledge for the Ugbo people.
̣ ` dá
Ìgbo´ ko ̣ is the gateway to Ìlàje ̣ communities and, until recently, the end of the
access road to the entire area. Consequently, Ìgbo´ ko ̣ ` dá
̣ is the headquarters of the
local government as well as the transit point for those travelling on the Atlantic
Ocean to other communities in the area. It is also considered a transit point
between the ‘semi-urban’ areas and the rest of the community. At the end of the
access road that enters the city is the bank of the river where inhabitants and
visitors usually board a canoe to the hinterland. A few metres before the bank of
the river is an imposing one-storey building. This building is known as the transit
house of the king of Ugbo Kingdom. During the period of my field work, Ọba6
Adebayo ̣ Akingbade Mafimis ̣ebi IV, the Olugbo of Ugbo Kingdom, occupied the
throne.7 During my third visit to the area in 2007, the Supreme Court had
removed Ọba Mafimis ̣ebi because Prince Akinrutan had challenged his ascension
to the throne, claiming it was the turn of his family to produce the king.
The building serves a dual purpose: a space where the king welcomes visitors who
may not want to travel over the river and a place where the king connects with
members of his subject population who either occupy positions of power within
the local administration or generally reside in the area.
6
Ọba means king in the Yorùbá language.
7
See, for example, < http://234next.com/csp/cms/sites/Next/Home/5513808-146/former_ruler_
sues_ondo_king_kingmakers.csp > , accessed 1 February 2010.

The boat ride to Ugbo, where the palace of Olugbo is situated, takes about
fifty minutes from Ìgbo´ kọ ` dá.
̣ The palace, painted in white, is the only ‘modern’
building in the kingdom. Social amenities such as electricity, roads,8 pipe-borne
water and hospitals are completely absent in the area. The palace, however,
has its own electricity generator. The palace waiting room also serves as the
community’s television-viewing centre. The palace even receives CNN signals
from its huge satellite dish mounted on the roof of the building. The site of the
palace is called Ode-Ugbo, which means ‘central Ugbo’ in the Ìlàje ̣ dialect
of Yorùbá.
Popular folksongs and divination poetry are two key ways in which
Ugbo legitimize their claim of ownership to the area’s land, ocean and natural
resources. Popular folksongs serve as a daily legitimization of ownership claims.
One such example is the saying tibé kárufe`,̣ ule` ̣ ti Oronmaken (sometimes also
used as a song), which literally means ‘From here [from Ugbo Kingdom] to Ilé-Ife` ̣
[the cradle of Yorùbá civilization], all land belongs to Oronmaken [the founder
of Ugbo Kingdom].’ As Ọba Mafimis ̣ebi explained, ‘The Odùduwà group
migrated from the east and met the Ugbo at Ilé-Ife`.̣ It took Odùduwà and his
group of migrants almost fifteen years to learn our language and adapt to our
culture.’
Local songs such as the one above reinforce how Ugbo narratives privilege the
abundance of oil and other natural resources in the area. This song precedes all
traditional prayers, festivals and meetings, and is akin to starting a Christian
prayer with the words ‘In the name of the Father . . .’. During my stay in Ìlàje ̣,
I often heard elders and chiefs sing the song at the beginning of an important
meeting or when receiving visitors. While this song refers to land, many Ìlàje ̣ will
point to the fact that here land is a symbol that represents all natural resources.
̣
The story of Àjàlo´ run, 9 the founder of Ilé-Ife`,̣ is representative of the types of
narrative used by the Ìlàje ̣ to justify their claims of ownership to natural resource
wealth. The Ugbo, as many informants told me – including Prince Adeye ̣mi,
who prides himself on being the ‘official’ historian of the Ugbo10 – believe that
̣
Àjàlo´ run descended from heaven and settled at Ilé-Ife` ̣ with many people.11
̣
Àjàlo´ run begat Oronmaken, the first Olugbo of Ugbo. When Àjàlo´ run ̣ was old,
he became blind, and an Ifá priest informed him that unless the Ugbo discovered
a sea, his sight would not be restored. Àjàlo´ run ̣ then gathered his children
and asked who could find the sea. Oronmaken offered to help find the sea and
cure his father’s blindness. Before Oronmaken started his journey, he consulted
an Ifá priest known as Ekango (Awo Oronmakenja, meaning ‘the priest of
8
By the time I was leaving the Niger Delta in September 2008, a contract had been awarded to
construct an access road linking Ugbo and other communities with Ìgbo´ ko ̣ ` dá.
̣
9
̣
Àjàlo´ run, according to many informants, means a deity who lives in heaven but decided to
descend to earth. Some informants suggest that he did this by descending with the help of a chain,
while others suggest he availed himself of an invisible object. What many agreed upon is the fact
that he is the progenitor of the Ugbo.
10
I interviewed Prince Adeye ̣mi on 16 June 2005 and I also interviewed several others in the
months of June and July 2005, and in August and September 2007 in Ìgbo´ ko ̣ ` dá.
̣ While I was at
Ugbo, I met many people who referred to Prince Adeye ̣mi as the historian of the Ugbo. Often
they suggested I go to him if I wished to learn the history of the Ugbo.
11
These people included Ọbàtálá, Ọbalufo ̣n, Ọbawerin, Obalufe ̣, Ogun, and Ọlo ̣ba of Ọba-Ile.

Oronmaken’). The priest told Oronmaken to perform certain rituals for a

successful journey, including use of ewua (‘rat’) to appease Ọlo´ nà ̣ (‘owner of the
road’) for easy access, òrònmadìye ̣ (‘day-old chick’) to appease his orí (‘head’),
and a dog carrying àpáàdì (‘hot broken pot’) with fire to appease Ògún (god of
iron).
After performing these rituals, Oronmaken travelled towards the coastal area
of today’s western Niger Delta with an entourage of many followers and relatives.
Based on Ifá divination, I was told, he first met ewua in the afternoon, who
showed him a portion of the road before disappearing. Disappointed that ewua
could not lead him to his final destination, Oronmaken placed a curse on ewua
that he would never again be seen in the afternoon.12
Oronmaken also encountered òròmadìye ̣ crying for attention. He quickly asked
òròmadìye ̣ for directions in return for his help, but, after showing Oronmaken the
way, the day-old chick disappeared. Oronmaken, I was told, said something
confidential to òròmadìye ̣, and only the priests and members of the Olugbo-
in-Council know that ‘special’ message, which the king refused to disclose. This
special message now constitutes part of the funeral ritual for a departed king, who
cannot be buried without this rite.
The dog showed Oronmaken a road that led to what is today Ode-Aye. It was
at this point that Oronmaken first saw the Atlantic Ocean. Its waves were so
powerful that Oronmaken thought people were flatulating inside the sea and
exclaimed ayé rèé, which means ‘what a wicked world’. At that spot, Oronmaken
began to recite incantations before touching the sea, but the sea goddesses
stopped him from doing so.
Through the power of Aramufen, Ọba Mafimis ̣ebi asserts, Oronmaken suc-
ceeded in capturing three sea goddesses: Kalagbinle olómi, Agbo, and Igodo. The
goddesses surrendered the power of the sea to Oronmaken. Oronmaken went
back to Ilé-Ife` ̣ with the three goddesses. On the way, he was said to have had
sexual intercourse with Igodo. When Oronmaken arrived in Ife`,̣ he used the
̣
seawater to cure Àjàlo´ run’s blindness. Later, he presented all three goddesses to
̣
Àjàlo´ run, in accordance with a tradition requiring sons to render account of their
stewardship after returning from a journey, and Àjàlo´ run ̣ took Igodo as a wife.
̣
Àjàlo´ run later discovered that Igodo was already pregnant, though Oronmaken
did not disclose his sexual exploit with her. When Àjàlo´ run ̣ died Oronmaken was
installed as Olufe13 (king of Ilé-Ife`).̣ However, his subjects disliked him because he
was a warrior and preferred his brother Aláyémo ̣re` ̣ because of his record of
goodwill in the community.14 To end the political impasse generated by the two
brothers’ struggle for control of Ilé-Ife`,̣ Araba, Oronmaken’s friend, later tricked
him out of the palace to pave the way for the ascension of Aláyémo ̣re` ̣ to the
throne. Frustrated by his sudden removal from power, Oronmaken left Ife` ̣ with
12
The Ìlàje ̣ believe seeing rats in the afternoon could portend danger because of the curse placed
on them by Oronmaken. To demonstrate the potency of this curse, many of my informants asked
me to walk in any of the villages in Ugbo Kingdom in the afternoon, guaranteeing I would never
see a rat during the daylight. (And indeed, I did not.)
13
The title literally means ‘owner of Ife`’.̣
14
The name means ‘someone who does good in the world’.

many of his supporters, wives and children. Many of these people established
kingdoms and towns on their way to Ugbo.
Important to the ways in which Ugbo narrate their story is how they give
̣
primacy to Àjàlo´ run’s descent from heaven. In many accounts given by other
communities, particularly the Mahin, Etikan and Aheri, there is also the myth of
someone descending from heaven. What this demonstrates is an attempt by each
group to pride itself as the first to occupy a particular space: the Ugbo are not
exceptional in this. What makes the Ugbo narrative interesting, as we shall see, is
how it is embedded in a claim of ownership. This claim is often reconstructed to
mobilize a subject population for protests against multinational oil corporations
and the Nigerian state.
̣
Therefore, this narrative of Àjàlo´ run’s journey includes many identifying
landmarks which Ugbo use to cement their claim to natural resource ownership.
These landmarks include rivers, the Atlantic Ocean, and towns or villages
established during migration from Ife`.̣ Many sites of offshore and onshore oil
platforms, wells and flow stations in the area such as Awoye and Abiteye are
today proudly shown as evidence of the divine manifestations of resource
ownership.
The king and members of his council also give prominence to Ifá divination,
which predates any written record. Ifá, a system of divination traditional to the
Yorùbá people of south-west Nigeria, is central to the ways in which Ìlàje ̣
narratives of belonging shape claims of resource ownership. Ifá represents one
Ugbo ritual that predates the arrival of the Odùduwà group at Ilé-Ife` ̣ and
supports Ugbo claims to ownership of land and natural resources, but also to Ilé-
Ife` ̣ itself. The recourse to the Ifá corpus15 by Ugbo further signifies the im-
portance of divination regarding the abundance of natural resources in the area.
One such example is when the oracle told Oronmaken that a specific sign would
indicate the place where he should establish the kingdom and such a place would
be flowing with natural resources. Ugbo believe many generations will not have to
work because there will be an abundance of wealth.
Many Ugbo that I interviewed believe the abundance of oil resources in their
present area is a manifestation of this promise of wealth through divine power.
They view this resource wealth as a form of compensation to Oronmaken and the
Ugbo, who lost Ilé-Ife` ̣ to the interplay of power and politics. Consequently, for
Ugbo it is not a coincidence that their land is the only area rich in oil and other
mineral resources in the Yorùbá-speaking area of south-west Nigeria; rather, this
is the result of an ancestral promise of wealth. To the Ugbo, the Atlantic Ocean
symbolizes the promised ‘sign’, and the Atlantic Ocean’s location represents the
actual area rich in natural resource wealth that the oracle directed Oronmaken to
after he lost the battle to succeed his father as ruler of Ilé-Ife`.̣ The Atlantic Ocean,
referred to as òkun both in Yorùbá language and Ìlàje ̣ local dialect, hosts several
oil platforms and flow stations offshore from the Ugbo kingdom.
15
Here, I use ‘Ifá corpus’ to refer to the large set of structured texts in Yorùbá cosmology. The
Ifá corpus constitutes a way of validating Yorùbá cultural and traditional practices as well as
accounting for how Yorùbá kingdoms are established. The Ugbo use this corpus in legitimating
their claims to oil and other natural resources in the region.

Central to this notion of divine power is the importance of Ọbàtálá and

Malokun to the understanding of ownership of wealth and resources in the entire
area. As told by many of my informants, Ọbàtálá does not refer to a specific
person; it means ‘the King that is great’ and is one of the ways to describe the
status of Olugbo. Ọbàtálá also means ‘the King that is in a white robe’, which is
why Olugbo always appears in white, whether in his official robes or in casual
dress, as a demonstration of his purity and lordship over the entire area. Another
song illustrates the king’s white robes: ‘èé olugbo, èé olugbo, as ̣o ̣ funfun tolugbo
miwo, o ̣ba Ìlàje ̣’, meaning ‘here comes Olugbo, king of Ìlàje ̣ who wears white
̣
robes’. Olugbo is addressed as Ọbàtálá o`sìrìmàgbò, Olúwaayé, alábàálàs ̣e ̣ tako
tako lóde Ìrànjé,16 meaning ‘Ọbàtálá, man of impeccable strength, lord of the
earth, master of all human beings, who has divine authority and is king of Ìlàje ̣’.
The king also uses the Ifá corpus to demonstrate claims of ownership and
belonging when he says:
If you go to Ifá divinations, Ọbàtálá was referred to as Òrìs ̣àń lá, which is Òrìs ̣à tó níle`,̣
i.e., the divine that owns the land. Ifá èjìogbè is the most senior of all odù Ifá, and it says
that kùtù kùtù Ọ ba Ugbo, Ọ ` sán gangan o ̣ba Mahin, Ọ bàtálá o`ṣ `re ̣e ̣ `màgbò,
̣ e ̣ni tí a bí lóde
Ugbo tó lo ̣ rèé jo ̣ba lóde Ìrànje. Ife` ̣ oyè lagbò, ibi ti ojú ti mońi
̣ wá (In the beginning was
king of Ugbo; later in life there was king of Mahin;17 Ọbàtálá o` sı ̣
̣ `rìmàgbò, a person born
in Ugbo who became king in Ìlàje ̣; Ife` ̣ of the Ugbo, where the world actually started
from). This is referring to the fact that the Ugbo own Ife`.̣ If you want to know that we
own Ife`,̣ check how Olugbo established a tradition at Ife` ̣ known as edi (wrestling), which
is today celebrated annually as a wrestling match between Ọbawiri (one of the Ugbo left
behind at Ife`)̣ and the Ọni of Ife`.̣ 18
This interpretation of the Ifá corpus, regarded as a form of divine knowledge,

strengthens Ugbo’s claims of ownership and belonging to a land rich in natural
resources. This claim to priority was not uncontested: another Ìlàje ̣ group, the
Mahin, also have narratives of origin asserting the prominence of the Mahin as
the first to occupy the space known as Ìlàje ̣ today.19 Indeed, it is clear that all the
neighbouring communities (Mahin, Etikan and Aheri) have different and
sometimes related stories of origin – connected to the sea and at the same time
positioning them as the first to occupy the geographical area of Ìlàje ̣. It is the way
in which the Ugbo make oil resources central to their myth of origin that makes
them stand out among these groups.
16
The king and the official historian of the kingdom both told me that Iranje was the group’s
original name, but it was mutilated by the Europeans when they came, which is why the group is
called Iranje today.
17
As stated earlier, Mahin is one of the four main kingdoms of the Ìlàje ̣.
18
Interview with Ọba Mafimis ̣ebi at his palace in Ode-Ugbo, 21 June 2005.
19
Although contestation between the Mahin and the Ugbo is not the object of this inquiry, it is
important to note that the earliest reports about the Ìlàje ̣ indicate that they migrated from Ilé-Ife ̣
(Curwen 1937; Akinjogbin and Ayandele 1980). According to Tade Iyao ̣mo ̣lere, a Mahin prince
considered to be the ‘official’ historian of the Mahin,19 there are two accounts of where the Mahin
come from. The first account is that of Ora, who was said to have owned Ilé-Ife`.̣ The second
account shows that Pétu was a son of Odùduwà, who after the death of his father migrated from
Ilé-Ife` ̣ with various stopovers until they got to Mahin. When Pétu died, his son Igoho, who
usually called himself Ọma-Pétu (child of Pétu) became the new leader and later crowned himself
the Amapetu of Mahin (King of Mahin).

What is common in all the narratives is the centrality of migration to the way in
which a claim of belonging is made by the different Ìlàje ̣ groups. What is absent in
the Mahin narrative is that they are yet to begin to make claims to ownership of
oil resources, understandably so because oil has yet to be found in their territory.
If the conflict in the Delta remains a reference point, it might not be long before
the Mahin, the Etikan and the Aheri begin to make similar claims, based on their
being ‘impacted communities’ in the oil era.20
More importantly, the Ugbo’s use of the Ifá corpus, a highly revered institution
among the Yorùbá, to reinforce their claim to ownership of land and other
resources illustrates not only their connection to the larger Yorùbá community
but also the unusual place they occupy as the only Yorùbá-speaking community
with abundant oil resources. Understanding the nature of this claim making and
how it is connected to the Atlantic Ocean – the source of offshore oil in the Ugbo
area – is critical to understanding the nature of belonging and the centrality of
ocean mythology.
FESTIVAL OF OIL: MALÒKUN AND THE CONSTRUCTION

OF RESOURCE OWNERSHIP
Malòkun – her name means owner of the Atlantic Ocean – is central in illustrating
how and why the ocean is important to Ugbo claims to ownership of oil resources.
The Ugbo consolidate their narrative of belonging and claim making through an
annual festival commemorating ancestral promises of wealth. As mentioned
earlier, the oracles told Oronmaken to look out for a particular sign and that the
location of this sign would be flowing with natural resources translatable to
wealth. As many Ugbo that I encountered during my stay in the area told me,
Oronmaken found this sign close to the Atlantic Ocean when he suddenly sighted
a beautiful woman who turned out to be a water goddess named Malòkun.
Oronmaken married Malòkun, who was said to have unimaginable prowess in
generating instant wealth for the king and his subjects. The kingdom was said to
have prospered beyond imagination in the entire region during the king’s
marriage to Malòkun.
Malòkun became the envy of other wives because of the special place accorded
to her by the king. When these wives made life unbearable for her in the palace,
she was said to have disappeared into the ocean and later turned into a deity with
signs indicating that she should be worshipped to avert war, hunger and an end to
their prosperity. Malòkun is now worshipped annually, and Ugbo also attribute
the abundance of offshore oil deposits in the area to her. A folksong corroborates
this connection:
Àrà mo fe´ ̣ olórííre o ̣ko ̣ mògé o ̣ko ̣ mògé o ̣ko ̣ mògé

(awe-inspiring, prosperous one, darling of the world)[repeated thrice]
Malòkun ùgbà wò fi ghún mi je ̣, mo rí bùtú bùtú
20
In many Niger Delta communities, impacted communities are villages and towns that also
feel the impact of oil exploration without necessarily having oil wells. Communities where there
are pipelines often make this claim.

(Malòkun, when you gave me plenty to eat I looked healthy and well-fed)
ùgbà wé fi ghún mi je ̣, mo rí ghára ghàra
(when you declined to feed me, I looked gaunt and unfed)
Àrà mo fe´ ̣ olórííre o ̣ko ̣ mògé, o ̣ba omi ju o ̣ba òkè lo ̣
(awe-inspiring, prosperous one, darling of the world, the king of the ocean is greater than
the king of the upland).
This song has also been associated with Olugbo, who is constantly referred to
as more powerful than the earthly king because he owns and rules over the
Atlantic Ocean and the resources that lie beneath it. While many Yorùbá
communities have a goddess or deity who signifies abundance of wealth to
community members, Ugbo are the only Yorùbá community who connect oil
resource abundance to such a deity, and have oil resources in their domain.
While the story of Malòkun is unique in its centrality to oil abundance, many
community members who claim to be Christians also integrate their ‘new’ religion
into the narrative of ancestral promises of wealth and prosperity. While this
integration underscores the growing influence of Christianity in the community, it
also indicates the hybridization of Christianity and ancestral modes of worship
within the community. Moreover, to corroborate this story and map how it plays
out in daily community life, I asked community members about the connection
between Christianity, Malòkun, and oil wealth.21 For example, when I asked
Dele, a middle-aged man who claimed to be a devout Christian, to explain why
I should believe the Ugbo claim to ownership of the oil resources in the area, he
justified his belief in the following way:
When it comes to wealth, even in the Bible, it was only fishermen that Jesus said I will
make fishers of men because in those days, fishermen were richer than farmers. And
before oil money from fish was the highest in the world. Today, our community is the
only one that produces oil in the entire south-west of Nigeria and this is because the
ancestors promised us wealth. Oil, fish, and all aquatic resources are the fulfilled
promises of our ancestors. Before oil exploration started, people came from all over the
world to buy fish from us. Many of our people became very rich and the whole
community witnessed an era of prosperity. With oil exploration, people from all over the
world now depend on us to sustain their life desires such as flying an airplane and driving
cars. This is exactly the promise of Jesus as well as a fulfilment of our ancestors’ desire
that we, fishermen and women, shall continue to prosper till eternity. (Dele, devout
Christian)22
This representative statement invokes the spirit of Malòkun and an ancestral

promise of wealth while also reiterating the important place Christian beliefs
occupy in the community. It also shows the incorporation of both ancestral
worship and Christianity into Ugbo narratives of belonging and claim making,
and demonstrates the everyday ways in which Ugbo make such claims.
21
Many of those I interviewed claimed to have converted to Christianity but never failed to
make the connection between ‘oil wealth’ represented by platforms and flow stations offshore in
the Atlantic Ocean, believed to have been made possible by Malòkun, and Christian doctrine as
stipulated in the Bible.
22
Interview, 15 August 2007, Ugbo.

`bì (The Oil Millionaire), a movie produced in 2005 by African Phillips

Eléporọ
Productions, reinforces this form of narrative that privileges community owner-
ship of natural resources. Eléporọ`bì illustrates ancestral ownership of land while
also demonstrating how the state, in collaboration with multinational corpor-
ations, alienated community members from access to land and natural resources.
Community youth realized that they were being exploited, and mobilized against
the corporations. In reaction, the state brought in the army to quell the protests.
The movie later shows negotiations between one family of ‘land owners’ and oil
executives. After the negotiation, oil executives paid millions in compensation to
this family with a promise to pay rents for oil exploration every year. This
agreement between multinational oil corporations and the family that negotiated
the deal transforms this family from being poor farmers to instant millionaires
because of the high percentage of funding that then flows from the corporations
to them. The main conclusion of the movie is that ancestral land and oil resources
are one pathway for some community members to become oil millionaires. This
story also illustrates the inequity that can arise when oil corporations negotiate
with individual families or members of the community rather than with the
community as a whole.
While Eléporọ `bì encapsulates the various levels of contestation over oil
resources in the Niger Delta, it also reinforces a particular narrative that
reverberates within the Ugbo Kingdom every day. This narrative is embedded
in ritual practices that make the invocation of a particular ‘sign’ emblematic of
claims to ownership of natural resources and belonging to a particular space
where such resources are in abundance. The importance of these narratives
signifies a shift to a regime of ownership of land, ocean and natural resources in
ways that make Ugbo a distinct entity within a larger Yorùbá political and ritual
community. I argue that this claim making is embedded in an imagined homeland
and derived from mythic origins that trace its genealogies to an ancestral promise
of prosperity. It is this ancestral promise of prosperity that drives the desire to
organize protests against multinational oil corporations and the Nigerian state in
an attempt to reclaim what many community members consider to be their
heritage. Closely connected to this perception of prosperity is the belief of many
community members that they are being cheated by the oil corporations, hence
the desire to reactivate the narrative of resource ownership as promised by the
ancestors towards mobilizing against the oil corporations and the state. I draw
upon Benedict Anderson’s idea of ‘imagined communities’ (Anderson 1991) to
suggest that the Ugbo collectively imagine a community based on memory and
divine power, which situates them within different sites connected to land and
resource ownership. It is this imagined community based on a particular narrative
of belonging that drives the aspiration to mobilize community members for action
aimed at reclaiming what is considered to be lost to multinational corporations.
These sites, derived largely from a rich, ritual production, enable a particular
narrative that privileges an imagined homeland rich in natural resources. This
imaginary homeland also possesses certain characteristics central to the pro-
duction of ritual forms. These ritual forms project Ugbo as traditional, divine,
and ‘chosen’ by the Creator as earthly inheritors of wealth through the invocation
of ancestral heritage. These narratives reproduce Ugbo as both traditional and
modern subjects through the hybridization of Christian beliefs and ritual practices
in ways that legitimize ownership of land and natural resources. Rituals and

performances of the notion of belonging by Ugbo include such acts as singing

songs, telling shared stories, and producing a particular culture and a common
convention that connects and centralizes oil and other natural resources as
important to the lived experiences of community members. These forms of per-
formance commonly draw on memory and produce homogeneity. Anderson
(1991) puts it succinctly when he points out that ‘no matter how banal the words
and mediocre the tunes, there is in this singing an experience of simultaneity’
(1991: 145), a comment that aptly describes Ìlàje ̣ performances, rituals and songs.
While Christian and ancestral beliefs are at odds with each other, they both
become useful tools for simultaneously legitimizing Ugbo’s claim to ownership of
oil, land and other natural resources.
The language of oil becomes a medium of expressing community feelings in
ways that produce and continue to reproduce representations of ancestral past
coated in a future that might result in reclaiming resource enclaves through per-
sistent protest action to regain lost territories. Occasions such as the performance
of Malòkun rituals legitimize claims of ownership and also echo similar ritual
performances by the state, such as national holidays and cultural festivals (Apter
2005), celebrating independence from colonial rule or the emergence of
democracy in a post-military or post-apartheid state. For the Ìlàje ̣, the production
of rituals of belonging and ownership through folksongs demonstrates how they
imagine themselves but also how they create connections to land, water and oil
resources.
In the next section, I demonstrate that the production and reproduction of this
narrative of belonging, embedded in memory and divine power, enables a
particular mode of claim making that is rooted in protests against multinational
oil corporations and the Nigerian state. Thus, using the example of the three-day
occupation of the Parabe oil platform in May 1998, I examine how the con-
struction of a particular narrative of ownership of land and natural resources
interacts with chieftainship and youth organizing in the production of particular
forms of knowledge that helped galvanize community members to taking action.
This form of action is geared towards an attempt at reclaiming what many com-
munity members claim they inherited from their ancestors. While many reports of
the Parabe protest highlight the important role played by the youth, I argue that
the protest represents ways in which oil-rich communities embed historical
narratives in their process of claim making.
SWEET CRUDE, POISONED LAND AND THE PARABE PROTEST
It was a gorgeous day in the summer of 2005; the scene was an elementary school
̣ ` dá
playground in the Ìgbo´ ko ̣ area of Ìlàje ̣. At about 2 p.m. a good turnout of
residents started gathering on the playground to listen to the latest information
about the lawsuit filed on behalf of their community against ChevronTexaco at a
court in San Francisco, in the United States.23 The court case Bowoto v. Chevron
was brought under the Alien Tort Claims Act of 1789, which allows foreigners to
23
On 1 December 2008 the jury exonerated Chevron from blame and again on 10 September
2010 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a jury verdict in favour of Chevron Corporation.

seek damages in US courts for alleged human rights violations abroad. In a

similar case over 30,000 Ecuadorians had filed a lawsuit against Texaco at a
New York court in 1993, seeking reparations from Texaco for contaminating
the Ecuadorian Amazon through its petroleum operations (Sawyer 2002). In the
same vein, the Bowoto/Concerned Ìlàje ̣ Citizens suit sought to hold Chevron
accountable for the human rights abuses and environmental and economic
damage against members of the Ìlàje ̣ community that arose from Chevron’s
complicity with the Nigerian military and their ‘kill and go’24 mobile police.
When the Ìlàje ̣ protested these environmental and human rights abuses caused by
Chevron’s oil-producing activities in their community, the protest attracted local
and international attention.
The Bowoto v. Chevron lawsuit was based on a 1998 incident in which Nigerian
soldiers shot non-violent protesters at Chevron’s Parabe offshore platform. The
soldiers were paid by Chevron, ferried to the platform in Chevron-leased
helicopters, and supervised by Chevron personnel. Two protesters were killed in
the brutal attack and others were injured and subsequently tortured.25 The claims
against Chevron included wrongful death of two protesters, assaults on protesters,
and battery and negligence under California and Nigeria law.26
Representatives of organizations, such as 8 United Oil Producing Com-
munities,27 Ìlàje ̣ Ultimate Oil Producing Communities, Ìlàje ̣ Major Oil Producing
Communities, Ìlàje ̣ Core Oil Producing Communities, Ìlàje ̣ Actual Oil Producing
Communities, and Ìlàje ̣ 9 Concessional Oil Producing Communities were present
at the 2005 meeting to discuss the court case. One of the representatives, Larry
Bowoto, the lead plaintiff in the case filed against Chevron under the auspices of
Concerned Ìlàje ̣ Citizens, had called the meeting. Bowoto announced that three of
the counsels from the group of attorneys representing Bowoto and others would
be visiting to interview members of the Concerned Ìlàje ̣ Citizens for the case.
Attorneys from Traber and Voorhees, EarthRights International, the Center for
Constitutional Rights and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, amongst others,
represented Bowoto and the Concerned Ìlàje ̣ Citizens. The meeting was full
of optimism even though the case was yet to be heard in court. This form of
optimism centred on the belief that Ìlàje ̣ affected by the activities of Chevron
could finally secure justice in the United States.
Two days after the meeting, three of the attorneys arrived to interview their
̣ ` dá,
clients. During the time the attorneys were in Ìgbo´ ko ̣ the venue of the inter-
views became a beehive of activity. During the first few days of the interviews,
I served as a translator for many of the Ìlàje ̣ who were interviewed. Serving as a
translator opened the door for me to further understand the intricacies of the
protest organized against Chevron in May of 1998. How did Parabe happen?
However, my analysis focuses mainly on the importance of the Parabe protest and the ways in
which Ìlàje ̣ make claims to ownership of oil resources on their land.
24
The Nigerian state set up the mobile police, popularly known as ‘kill and go’ as a specialized,
rapid response force.
25
See < http://www.earthrights.org/legal/bowoto-v-chevron-case-overview > , accessed 15
February 2013.
26
For more details on this case, see Bowoto v. Chevron, suit NO: C99-02506.
27
The number eight denotes the number of communities with oil extraction within their
domain.

Who organized the protest? What is the relationship between the protest and Ìlàje ̣
claims to ownership of oil and land? The next section addresses these questions.
DEATH, PROTEST AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF DEFIANCE
One significant event shaped the ways in which Ìlàje ̣ began to think about making
claims to their land and oil. In the early 1990s, Ken Saro Wiwa led the Movement
for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP) to make demands for the thousands
of Ogoni in the Niger Delta (Apter 2005; Smith 2007; Okonta 2008). Saro Wiwa’s
organized protest against Shell and the Nigerian state in Ogoniland led to his
execution alongside eight other Ogoni environmental activists in November 1995
after their trial before a military tribunal. After the Ken Saro Wiwa incident and
the attendant international recognition that the Ogoni acquired, other oil-
producing communities came together to form associations to demand benefits
from oil corporations and ask for greater participation in corporate operations in
their area. For the Ìlàje ̣, the claim to ownership of oil and land is not only rooted
in their rich history, as highlighted earlier, but also gains a contemporary thrust
from the events of 1995 when many communities, reacting to the execution of
Saro Wiwa, began to form associations laying claim to ownership of land and oil
resources in the Niger Delta. The Ìlàje ̣ formed their organizations as part of this
movement and today there are nine such associations representing oil-producing
communities in the Ìlàje ̣ area. The Concerned Ìlàje ̣ Citizens and AISECUM (an
acronym representing the first letter of the names of all the associations in the
area) became the umbrella body for all the groups. While the central objectives of
all these groups focus on recognition as the owners of oil resources, they also
demand employment opportunities from Chevron and other multinational
corporations, community development projects, and compensation for environ-
mental degradation.
Protests against Big Oil are not new, as demonstrated in the protests against
Texaco in Ecuador and protests in many Niger Delta communities (Sawyer 2002;
Okonta 2008; Watts 2003). What makes the Parabe protest against Chevron
different is the multidimensional nature of its planning and the collaboration
between chiefs and youths. The planning of the Parabe protest was not only em-
bedded in rights, particularly human and environmental rights, but also inscribed
with claims of ownership of resources based on ancestral promises of wealth.
While most previous protests in the Delta did not include the participation of
chiefs and elders (Watts 2003), community elders and chiefs supported the youth
participants in the Parabe protest. Some of the youth have a background in
environmental rights training28 and connections to elders and chiefs’ councils in
Ìlàje ̣ communities. While the youths occupied Parabe, the chiefs/elders and youths
of the communities made decisions about when and how to organize the protests
jointly. This collaboration challenges the prevailing view that chiefs and elders
and youths are often in opposition when it comes to dealing with oil corporations
because of the divide-and-rule tactics of the corporations (Watts 2003;
28
Some of the participants, as informants told me, have affiliations with Environmental Rights
Action, the local branch of Friends of the Earth International.

Smith 2007). The Ìlàje ̣’s ability to embed their narrative of belonging and
ownership of land and oil resources when making claims against corporations and
the Nigerian state echo similar claim-making processes among oil-rich Niger
Delta communities (Adunbi 2011).
Such processes of claim making further reinforce the belief of many Ìlàje ̣,
particularly those organizing against multinational oil corporations and the
Nigerian state, that utilizing the myth of ownership of oil can help galvanize the
youth while at the same time cementing the important role of chiefs and elders,
who are knowledgeable about both history and the place of the divine in society.
Thus, the Parabe protest confirms for the Ìlàje ̣ youth a particular place in the
history of their community as told by the elders and chiefs and acted by the youths
against corporations and the state. The novel ways in which the youth have in-
corporated human and environmental rights rhetoric into the rhetoric of
resources as community property, taking on the corporations who act in tandem
with the state, represents one of the unique features of the Parabe protest.
As I was told by many of my informants, prior to the occupation of the Parabe
oil platform in May 1998, several meetings were held within the communities.
Discussion at those meetings focused on how oil production in the area has done
more harm than good to the ecosystem and to human and material resources, and
how the federal government of Nigeria and the oil corporations are the only ones
who benefit from oil production. Many made the point that oil corporations,
particularly Chevron, do not recognize the interest of the communities where they
operate as part of their responsibility as producers; this, they argued, is because
the corporations view themselves as responsible to the federal government that
gives them their operating licences. As one informant told me,
Today the communities are devastated because they can no longer engage in fish and
cash crop farming. Secondly, fish farming has become expensive because fishermen now
travel several miles to catch any significant quantity of fish. They have also had to rely on
engine boats to do this, unlike in the past when they could cast their nets and get fish in
abundance at their backyard. Those into cash cropping are no longer able to do this
because of sea incursion into their land as a result of indiscriminate dredging.29
At meetings, the youth, who are knowledgeable in human and environmental

rights rhetoric, emphasize how oil production has degraded their environment,
denied them their livelihood, and subjected them to double marginalization
because they are not able to farm or fish and they are also unable to get jobs from
corporations who use their land. Consequently, they consider the Nigerian state
insensitive. The elders and chiefs emphasize the fact that oil production is
gradually eroding the tradition and customs of the people. The chiefs and elders
dwell on how sacred forests and shrines such as Ojuolotupa in the Ikorugho
community have been desecrated by oil production. Many elders will talk about
how their ancestral promise of wealth has been mismanaged by the corporations
in ways that have degraded their environment and undermined their ways of life
and traditions.
29
̣ ` dá.
Interview, June 2005, Ìgbo´ ko ̣

Adding insult to the perceived injury to customs and traditions, Chevron and
other oil corporations do not appear to consider community members good
enough for employment. Narrating his experience, Ojo, one of the participants at
the meeting, stated that on completion of his university education he had taken
more than four aptitude tests organized by ChevronTexaco but was never
successful. Questioning the criteria used by the multinational corporations in
conducting the test, he stated that it was hard to believe that most Ìlàje ̣ candidates
consistently underperformed, and suggested that the corporations were biased
against giving jobs to the Ìlàje ̣. Reeling out statistics, he opined that between 1962
and 2001, only 6 Ìlàje ̣, 19 Ijaw, and 35 Itsekiri have been employed by
ChevronTexaco.30 Between 2001 and 2002, two tests were conducted by Chevron
to correct this inequity, but Ìlàje ̣ still did not pass the employment test.
For example, in a letter written to the then military administrator of Ondo
State on 5 May 1998, Concerned Ìlàje ̣ Citizens claimed that since 1994 about
2,500 Nigerians had been employed by Chevron, of whom only two were
̣ – despite the fact that close to 20 per cent of Chevron’s oil production in
Ìlàje31
Nigeria come from the Ìlàje ̣ area. Many Ìlàje ̣ accordingly wonder why they
should not derive more benefit from a resource that they not only own but was put
there by their ancestors for their benefit. Thus, both elders/chiefs and youth draw
attention to the ironic correlation between ownership of natural resources and
denial of employment opportunities. As many told me, their inability to control
what they own is directly responsible for the plight of their sons and daughters
who are denied employment by Chevron and other corporations in the area.
Consequently, they believe they need to protest to reclaim what they consider to
be their heritage.
Membership in the community, anchored in the belief that oil and land belong
to communities rather than the Nigerian state, helped to shape the nature and
form of the Parabe protest. After the series of meetings, decisions were taken to
organize a protest. The protest was not only aimed at drawing attention to the
plight of the Ìlàje ̣. It also became a way of reiterating the Ìlàje ̣ belief that oil and
land are resources promised by their ancestors. As Chief Melshedek E. Meduoye,
the Baale of Beku, told me in an interview,
I was one of the community leaders that took the decision to organize a protest against
Chevron. Each community nominated five youths to protest at Parabe against the lack of
jobs, oil spillage, and lack of attention to the communities. At the end of the protest,
Nigerian soldiers drafted to quell the protest killed two people and several others were
injured. Prior to the protest we had written several letters to Chevron highlighting all of
these issues but they refused to listen to us. Therefore, we decided to organize as a
community to take a step towards reclaiming our heritage, our land and what our
ancestors bequeath to us as a people.32
30
I made an attempt to confirm this statistic with Chevron officials but did not succeed. It is
also important to note that this situation is not particular to the Ìlàje ̣. In every oil community in
the Delta stories are often told of how community members are denied employment opportunities
with the oil corporations. This situation illustrates the level of disconnection between the
corporations and the host communities.
31
Letter obtained from one of the officials of Concerned Ilaje Citizens while doing field work in
the area.
32
̣ ` dá.
Interview conducted in June 2005 at Ìgbo´ ko ̣

Corroborating this assertion is the affidavit submitted in court documents by one

of the central figures of the protest, Ola-Judah Ajidibo. According to Ajidibo,
Before the men left for the Parabe Platform, they were given instructions by the elders
and by me at the direction of the elders. The elders and I told them that no one was to
carry any firearms or other weapons onto the platform, that no one was to drink alcohol
or use other drugs, and that the protest was to be orderly and entirely peaceful. Bola
Oyinbo was appointed to lead those men who travelled out to the platform in boats on
May 25, 1998. With the approval of the chiefs and leaders, I told Bola that he was to
speak with the naval security on the Parabe Platform at his arrival, explain the reason for
the protest, and provide the naval officers with copies of our recent letters to Chevron.
Again with the approval of the chiefs and elders, I told Bola that he was then to request a
meeting with whomever was in charge for Chevron on the platform and that he was to
ask that individual to contact [CNL managing director] George Kirkland in order to set
up a meeting between Mr Kirkland and the elders and chiefs onshore. (Case 3:99-cv-
02506-SI Document 1640, filed 08/14/2007, p. 9)
The protest therefore became a way of illustrating Ìlàje ̣ claims to ownership of

oil to the Nigerian state and also to the rest of the world. When the protest
occurred, many global news outlets reported its impact on world oil production.
One of the internal emails from Chevron’s (then) Public Affairs Manager for
Africa, Europe and the Middle East, Joseph Lorenz, indicated to the Public
Affairs Officer, S ̣o ̣la Ọmo ̣le, that if the media were to report on the Parabe
incident, Chevron would then announce to the world that the Parabe facilities
handle about 70,000 barrels per day, and that Chevron would be optimistic of a
peaceful resolution.33 Fearing that a reduction of close to that quantity of daily
production could result in a loss of revenue if the protests continued, Chevron – so
many community members alleged – informed the Nigerian state, who in turn
invited soldiers to quell the protest.
The protest lasted for three days, during which period over 100 youths occupied
the Parabe oil platform. During the three days34 many protesters, I was told,
engaged in dancing and occasionally singing popular local songs, including the
one discussed above: ‘tibé kárufe`,̣ ule` ̣ ti Oronmaken’ (here understood to mean
‘from the location of the platform all the way to Ilé-Ife`,̣ all land belongs to
Oronmaken’). These performances by protesters reify the central belief of the Ìlàje ̣
that oil is a manifestation of an ancestral promise. Protest becomes a way of
legitimizing that claim while embellishing the protest with human and environ-
mental rights rhetoric embedded in denial of access to the benefits of oil
exploration in Ìlàje ̣ communities. Therefore, framing the protest as a way of
reclaiming what ancestors promised community members, and not only as an
attempt at securing more benefits for their communities from Chevron, reinforces
the Ìlàje ̣ as a community that is distinct because of its rich oil resources.
33
Email obtained through one of my informants while doing fieldwork.
34
For more on the protest, see for example, < http://sfbayview.com/tag/bowoto-v-chevron/ > ,
accessed 11 October 2011.

CONCLUSION
The greater part of the literature on the Yorùbá people of south-west Nigeria has
focused on myth of origin, ritual production and performances. This scholarship
addresses myths of origin by concentrating on the connection between ritual
production and political imagination that derives largely from power. These
studies have not explored the centrality of oil and other natural resources in the
production of an Ìlàje ̣/Ugbo identity. This unanswered question is at the heart of
my analysis of how Ìlàje ̣, a Yorùbá community, produce particular narratives,
performances and songs in ways that place oil, land and other natural resources
at the centre of what I call an Ìlàje ̣ wealthland. Today, these narratives are
embedded in protest forms challenging multinational oil corporations and the
Nigerian state. Recourse to the narratives of myth of origin through claims to
ownership of oil resources enables Ìlàje ̣ youths to connect a modern rhetoric of
rights with historical narratives of belonging.
Similarly, these forms of ritual production project Ìlàje ̣ into the centre of
resource contestation through the generation of a distinct identity that
simultaneously positions Ìlàje ̣ as Yorùbá while at the same time injecting Ìlàje ̣
into the larger Niger Delta politics of oil imaginaries. Central to this ritual
production, as I have argued, is how Ìlàje ̣ continually use the narratives to critique
their inability to derive benefits from abundant oil resources that they claim to
own. The Ìlàje ̣ are not able to derive benefits, they say, because multinational
corporations in alliance with the state have consistently, for many years, denied
them this opportunity. Therefore, inscribed in Ìlàje ̣’s notion of belonging is the
perception that narratives of origin can be better utilized if reconstructed to
mobilize action against corporations. Out of this came the Parabe protest that
redefined the politics of claim making among the Ìlàje ̣.
Claims of natural resource ownership have also deepened the ways in which
some Ìlàje ̣ communities reshape notions of community and belonging. Out of this
comes a form of belonging to a unique Ìlàje ̣ community where elders, chiefs and
youth interact and interrelate on the basis of a common bond: an ancestral
promise of wealth. Community members, by incorporating rhetoric of human
and environmental rights and democratic values into traditional nodes of
organizing, are therefore devising new methods of organizing and making claims
not only from oil corporations but also on the Nigerian state. The Parabe protest
exemplifies the interaction between nodes of traditional organizing and the
rhetoric of environmental and human rights, as well as reinforcing claims to
ownership of land and oil resources. Understanding these particular narratives, I
argue, has important consequences for the ways we rethink the interconnected-
ness of natural resource wealth to the broader political imaginaries of belonging,
governance, resource ownership, ritual production and performances.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am grateful to Derek Peterson, Feyi Adunbi, Elisha Renne, Kelly Askew, Kamari Clarke,
Olus ̣eye ̣ Ades ̣o ̣la, J. D. Y. Peel, Adam Ashforth, Andrew Apter, J. Lorand Matory,
Adélékè Adéè ḳ ó ,̣ Henry Drewal, Mike McGovern, Jide Ọlo ̣lajulo ̣, Lawson Akintokun and
Ọba Afo ̣labi Odidio ̣mo ̣ (Olu of Ìgbo´ ko
̣ ` dá)
̣ for their suggestions. I am particularly grateful

to the organizers and participants at the Mellon-Sawyer Ethnicity in Africa conference on

The Making of the Yorùbá at the University of Michigan. I am also grateful to the audience
at the annual meetings of the American Anthropological Association and the African
Studies Association, where various versions of this article were presented. The fieldwork on
which the article is based was conducted between June 2005 and April 2008. The research
was made possible through the generosity of the McMillan Center at Yale, Yale Law
School, Yale African Studies Program, and Yale Department of Anthropology.
REFERENCES
Adunbi, O. (2011) ‘Oil and the production of competing subjectivities in Nigeria:

“platforms of possibilities” and “pipelines of conflict” ’, African Studies Review
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Anderson, B. (1991) Imagined Communities: reflections on the origin and spread of
nationalism. London: Verso.
Apter, A. (1992) Black Critics and Kings: the hermeneutics of power in Yorùbá
society. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.
——– (2005) The Pan-African Nation: oil and the spectacle of culture in Nigeria.
Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.
Atanda, J. A. (1980) An Introduction to Yorùbá history. Ibadan: Ibadan
University Press.
Barber, K. (1982) ‘Popular reactions to the Petro-Naira’, Journal of Modern
African Studies 20 (3): 431–50.
Bascom, W. R. (1969) The Yorùbá of Southwestern Nigeria. New York NY: Holt,
Rinehart and Winston.
Clarke, K. M. (2004) Mapping Yorùbá networks: power and agency in the making
of transnational communities. Durham NC: Duke University Press.
Curwen, R. J. M. (1937) ‘Ìlàje ̣ intelligence report’, National Archives, Ibadan,
Nigeria.
Medani, M. K. (2011) ‘Strife and secession in Sudan’, Journal of Democracy
22 (3): 135–49.
Mitchell, T. (2009) ‘Carbon democracy’, Economy and Society 38 (3): 399–432.
Okonta, I. (2008) When Citizens Revolt: Nigerian elites, big oil, and the Ogoni
struggle for self-determination. Trenton NJ: Africa World Press.
Olupo ̣na, J. K. (1991) Kinship, Religion and Rituals in a Nigerian Community: a
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Peel, J. D. Y. (1983) Ijeshas and Nigerians: the incorporation of a Yorùbá kingdom,
1890s–1970s. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
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Sawyer, S. (2002) ‘Bobbittizing Texaco: dis-membering corporate capital and
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Watts, M. (2003) ‘Petro-violence: community extraction and political ecology of a

mythic commodity’ in M. Watts and N. Peluso (eds), Violent Environments.
Ithaca NY: Cornell University Press.
FILM
`bì [The oil millionaire] (film).

African Phillips Productions (2005) Eléporọ
ABSTRACT
This article examines the genealogies of the Ìlàje ̣ and the narrative of belonging
that reinforces claims to ownership of land and natural resources such as oil. The
article maps how oil flow stations, pipelines and platforms have come to represent
an ancestral promise of wealth to many members of Ìlàje ̣ communities. This claim
making is embedded in a mythic origin that continuously reinforces a distinct
identity that projects an imagined community connected to the Yorùbá of south-
west Nigeria as well as the oil-rich Niger Delta region. While many scholars have
studied the myth of origin of the Yorùbá, in most cases focusing on rituals and
political imagination that intersect with linguistic evidence in determining
Yorùbá identity, these scholars have often neglected the centrality of these
myths to oil resources. Thus, I investigate how the Ìlàje ̣ narrative of belonging
creates its own specificity of ‘ownership’ of natural resources through ritual
performances connected to migration and dispersal of subject populations.
I examine how such narratives create spaces of opportunity for the organization
of protests against multinational oil corporations and the Nigerian state.
RÉSUMÉ
Cet article examine les généalogies des Ìlàje ̣ et le récit d’appartenance qui renforce
les revendications de propriété de terres et de ressources naturelles comme le
pétrole. Il analyse la manière dont les stations de pompage, oléoducs et plates-
formes pétrolières en sont venus à représenter une promesse de richesse ancestrale
pour de nombreux membres des communautés ìlàje. Ce processus de revendica-
tion s’inscrit dans une origine mythique qui renforce en permanence une identité
distincte qui projette une communauté imaginée liée aux Yorùbá du sud-ouest du
Nigeria et de la région du delta du Niger, riche en pétrole. Parmi les nombreux
chercheurs qui ont étudié le mythe de l’origine des Yorùbá, une majorité s’est
attachée à déterminer l’identité yorùbá en s’intéressant aux rituels et à
l’imagination politique qui s’entremêlent avec les éléments linguistiques,
négligeant souvent la centralité de ces mythes vis-à-vis des ressources pétrolières.
C’est pourquoi l’auteur étudie comment le récit d’appartenance des Ìlàje ̣ crée sa
propre spécificité de « propriété » des ressources naturelles à travers des
représentations rituelles liées à la migration et à la dispersion des populations
concernées. Il examine comment ces récits créent des espaces d’opportunité pour
l’organisation de protestations contre les multinationales pétrolières et l’état
nigérian.

Mythic Oil Resources Belonging and The Politics of Claim Making Among The Ilaje Yoruba of Nigeria

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Mythic Oil Resources Belonging and The Politics of Claim Making Among The Ilaje Yoruba of Nigeria

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Africa 83 (2) 2013: 293–313 doi:10.

MYTHIC OIL: RESOURCES, BELONGING

ỌMỌLADE ADUNBI is a political anthropologist and an Assistant Professor in the Department of

© International African Institute 2013

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

MYTH, MIGRATION AND GENEALOGIES OF BELONGING

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

FIGURE 1 An aerial view of one of the sixteen quarters (Èjìnédógún) of

FIGURE 2 Canoe petrol station

a distinct identity connected to natural resources, particularly oil. My point of

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

to ownership of oil resources. Where and how do migration and dispersal

IMAGINING THE ‘WEALTHLAND’: MYTH, MEMORY,

The Ugbo people consider themselves to be the ‘original’ inhabitants of Ilé-Ife` ̣

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

Oronmaken’). The priest told Oronmaken to perform certain rituals for a

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

Central to this notion of divine power is the importance of Ọbàtálá and

This interpretation of the Ifá corpus, regarded as a form of divine knowledge,

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

FESTIVAL OF OIL: MALÒKUN AND THE CONSTRUCTION

Àrà mo fe´ ̣ olórííre o ̣ko ̣ mògé o ̣ko ̣ mògé o ̣ko ̣ mògé

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

This representative statement invokes the spirit of Malòkun and an ancestral

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

`bì (The Oil Millionaire), a movie produced in 2005 by African Phillips

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

performances of the notion of belonging by Ugbo include such acts as singing

SWEET CRUDE, POISONED LAND AND THE PARABE PROTEST

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

seek damages in US courts for alleged human rights violations abroad. In a

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

DEATH, PROTEST AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF DEFIANCE

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

At meetings, the youth, who are knowledgeable in human and environmental

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

Corroborating this assertion is the afﬁdavit submitted in court documents by one

The protest therefore became a way of illustrating Ìlàje ̣ claims to ownership of

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

to the organizers and participants at the Mellon-Sawyer Ethnicity in Africa conference on

Adunbi, O. (2011) ‘Oil and the production of competing subjectivities in Nigeria:

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

Watts, M. (2003) ‘Petro-violence: community extraction and political ecology of a

`bì [The oil millionaire] (ﬁlm).

https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972013000053 Published online by Cambridge University Press

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