Nigeria 2024 – IRPI media

Once rich in biodiversity, the Niger Delta gave local communities everything they needed — especially through fishing. But things changed in the 1960s, when oil companies like Agip (now Eni) and Shell began extracting “sweet oil,” easy to refine and highly profitable.

Decades of negligence, corruption, and conflict turned the Delta into one of the most polluted places on Earth. Spills, sabotage, broken promises, and widespread gas flaring have left behind poisoned water, dead mangroves, polluted air, and abandoned livelihoods.

Today, very little has changed. Clean-ups are insufficient. Most communities have received neither justice nor compensation — even those who went to court. Meanwhile, many oil giants are gradually shifting their operations offshore, where extraction is easier to control and less exposed to local unrest — leaving behind a devastated and polluted onshore region, often without proper clean-up or accountability.

The Niger Delta is often cited as one of the clearest examples of ecocide.

In April 2025, IRPI Media and FADA Collective travelled to Rivers and Bayelsa States to investigate what remains. We met communities still fighting legal battles, others long forgotten. We spoke with Niger Delta activists who continue to demand justice and environmental restoration. We interviewed former rebel leaders, kings with questionable alliances, and those trying — against all odds — to clean up the land and water.

This November 2025 marks 30 years since the execution of environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and the “Ogoni Nine.” While his legacy should stand as a symbol of resistance, the Nigerian government is now considering restarting oil operations in Ogoniland — Saro-Wiwa’s homeland. At the same time, President Tinubu has controversially “pardoned” the Ogoni Nine, raising troubling questions about how memory, justice, and history are being reshaped.

Does Ken Saro-Wiwa’s memory truly live on?
And is the fight for environmental justice still alive?

In this long-term project supported by ReCommon and carried out together with Lorenzo Bagnoli and Davide Lemmi, we published a series of investigative reports on several media outlets to tell what remains — and what’s still unfolding — in the Niger Delta.