Ken Saro-Wiwa was a prominent Nigerian author, activist and television producer. He garnered attention by leading a nonviolent campaign against the multinational petroleum industry. That industry recklessly dumped petroleum waste in Saro-Wiwa’s home region, the Nigerian delta, which gave rise to severe environmental damage.
Saro-Wiwa was born on 10 October 1941 into a prominent Ogoni family. As a child, he demonstrated a talent for scholarship and, upon completing his secondary schooling at Government College Umuahia, he won a scholarship to read English at the University of Ibadan.
He taught briefly at the University of Lagos after graduating in 1965. But he soon left that position to pursue a bureaucratic career, and served as a federal administrator for the Bonny Island oil terminal. Nigeria experienced a civil war between 1967 and 1970, and during the conflict, Saro-Wiwa supported the government’s goal of preventing the state of Biafra from seceding. He gained an appointment as the commissioner for education in the Rivers State as a reward for his support.
He left government service in 1973 because he advocated greater autonomy for the Ogoni people. But he achieved considerable success in that decade in a variety of commercial ventures in real estate and retail. In the 1980s, though, he shifted his focus from business to television production, writing and journalism. He wrote a satirical television series, Basi & Company, which looked at looked at the lives of gang members in Lagos. The series was reportedly the most popular television series in Africa in its day. He also published books such as Sozaboy, and Forest of Flowers, and wrote a regular column for the Lagos Times. He managed to gain an audience beyond Nigeria due to his newspaper writing.
Saro-Wiwa served in one presidential administration in the late 1980s. But his service did not last for long and by the end of the decade he had come to believe that corruption was an entrenched feature of Nigeria’s successive military regimes and that that unfortunate state of affairs could not be challenged from within the existing political structure.
In 1990, he helped found the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP). He also wrote the Ogoni Bill of Rights and worked with Greenpeace International. He became the principal opposition leader in Nigeria. And MOSOP was one of the most visible groups that stood in opposition to economic exploitation of Nigeria’s oil resources, and the concomitant environmental fallout.
But his position atop the oppositional hierarchy was far from secure. MOSOP divided into competing factions. Some people within the fold advocated and resorted to violence. And some Ogoni tribal leaders believed in ongoing negotiation with international oil companies. So he found himself between people with irreconcilable approaches.
On 21 May 1994, four people who opposed Saro-Wiwa were killed in an attacked orchestrated by a group affiliated with MOSOP. Saro-Wiwa had typically decried the use of violence. But he was arrested and tried by a Nigerian military court all the same along with eight other people. The defendants were referred to as the Ogoni Nine. Saro-Wiwa was sentenced to death. And despite international protestation regarding the unfairness of the procedure, he was executed by hanging on 10 November 1995 before he could appeal his conviction.
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its kinda long but in short kurds have always wanted independence because of their history plus it looked like a good idea at the time, and they became an US ally because of isis and they sold their oil to the US because of this
the kurds have for a long time believe in the creation of an independent kurdistan, many diferent groups from conservatives to communist have had the same view until kinda recently, its important to know that ever since syria’s independence they havent treated the kurds well, from taking away their citizenship, deport them, to supressing the kurd language, search the arab belt for more info. all of this happened during assad’s dad goverment.
so kurds dont have an identity as syrians so when the goverment almost lost the civil war they decided to just declare independence, now why arent they independent its nato politics basically.
so the civil war started and it happend mostly in the south-centre of the country so assad moved all the military units (including the ones in rojava) to the south to face the rebels, this allowed the kurdish parties to unite and take over the region without much trouble and they formed some militias like the YPJ to defend themselfs, they were 2 main factions the conservative KNC that wanted to join the rebels and the PYD that wanted to stay neutral, the PYD led faction won because most kurds just didnt want to fight a civil war, but then ISIS attacked.
when Isis crossed iraq into syria their first enemy was the kurds and those were some of the first clashes, and they fought the YPJ and other militias, the USA decided to support the kurds with weapons and other supples mostly to contain Isis expansion and the kurds, this support and the victories vs Isis made the kurds really happy and greedy so they decided to declare independence and formed the Democratic Federation of Rojava – Northern Syria, which was denouced by assad and the rebels.
so the main problem with this was that Turkey would never let a independent kurd state exist, because like 1/4 of their territory is majority Kurd and they have been fighting a war against kurds since the cold war, another problem was that Rojava was influeced by Ocalan the PKK who were one of Turkeys biggest enemies, so because of this Turkey entered the civil war to support the syrian rebels who had basically lost at that point and made the remnants a bunch of mostly pro-turk islamists (the free syrian army is kinda like Turkey’s wagner group at this point), they also used this to attack rojava and bombed them.
because Turkey was an existencial threat to Rojava and Assad they made a pact to cooperate, syria would give the kurds autonomy and rojava would no be independent.
another point is that Rojava’s alliance with the USA never ended so they have troops station on rojava, also the Kurds have under their control the most important oil fields in the country so they sold that to the USA to pay for their budget, and the USA troops defend those oil fields. also the sale of that oil doesnt go to syria so for some thats stealing from Syria’s resources. also the USA would never side with Rojava and recognize them as independent if that makes the turks mad, like we saw with finland and sweden wanting to join the otan but turkey was blocking them
sorry if its too long
because Turkey was an existencial threat to Rojava and Assad they made a pact to cooperate, syria would give the kurds autonomy and rojava would no be independent
see i remember that but there’s posters salivating about the arabs rising up and treating them unkindly because they were ‘collaborators’… when im under the impression they’re getting on now. the US troops are complicated a) you can’t exactly vote them out as proven by Iraq, b) the Turks are holding back as long as they’re there.
