Macro-factors affecting the conflict

Poverty

Like the rest of Nigeria, underlying the political tension in the Niger Delta is a lack of economic development in remote rural regions and acute poverty and deprivation in its towns and cities. There are few jobs, poor housing, inadequate - or more usually non-existent - sanitation, little in the way of education or public health provision by the State. An overall sense of despair about the future pervades, amidst some of the worst pollution anywhere on Earth. [9]

Per capita, and on paper, it may well be argued that people living in the centre and North of Nigeria are worse off than the citizens of oil States are. However, a simmering resentment is widely felt - directed towards both the government and oil companies - at the failure to deliver the billions of dollars derived from oil and gas production since the 1960s back to the communities the wealth came from. It is this widely felt sense of injustice caused by disparities of both income and opportunity that is driving the conflict, not the macroeconomics of poverty. Access to basic necessities has been impossible for ordinary people to acquire from either the Nigerian State government or the oil companies operating in the region. Despair has meant people are increasingly pursuing alternative - often illegal - avenues of access.

Widespread unemployment - especially of young men - has created a fertile recruitment ground for militias and gangs involved in criminal rackets, including the industrial-scale theft of oil. This "standing army of the dispossessed" can also be used by various political groupings as foot soldiers in vote rigging at election time, and in politically-motivated violence in the run up to polls. [10] Politically-motivated violence at the time of the 2003 elections, [11] gang-related violence - which left more the 500 dead during the late Summer of 2004 [12] - and military operations in 2004 against militias, in particular targeting Asari's group, has created a fragile sense of public order and security.

Historically, successive Nigerian governments have failed to redistribute the derivation of oil revenues due to producer communities guaranteed in Law, currently 13% of receipts distributed to State governments. The Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) [13] is presently charged with distributing an additional block of funds which is set at a further 15% of revenues accruable to Niger Delta States, and 3% of the operating budget of oil companies. In theory these funds will be applied under a long delayed 'master plan,' but in practice there has been application of funds to a range of projects where the separation between State and Federal government's existing priorities is far from clear. This inaction on the NDDC plan is really a symptom of a much deeper malaise: a basic lack of political will to deliver wealth back to ordinary people. [14]

It is not easy to break away from the dominant cycle of patrimonial corruption that results in poverty for the masses. This transition requires those in power to make themselves vulnerable to change by removing the corrupt measures that currently guarantee their short-term political security. Nigeria isn't a poor country: it has a substantial revenue stream from oil (the fifth biggest producer in OPEC.) With recent dramatic rises in the price of oil this has increased to the point where Nigeria's foreign reserves exceed $38 billion. Additionally, Nigeria has an enormous, untapped human and agricultural potential, both neglected due to the mono focus on oil since the 60s.

The lack of will to raise the majority of Nigerians out of poverty has its roots in pure greed on the part of a tiny minority of the powerful; in political and business corruption, and a lack of transparency in the oil industry. The picture isn't totally bleak, however. The substantial rise in oil income and recent debt relief provide unprecedented opportunities to diversify the economy and improve vital services in health and education. [15]