In 1995 the Nigerian military dictatorship executed Ken
Saro-Wiwa and 8 other Ogoni activists to end their opposition to Shell’s
activities in the Niger Delta. This was the culmination of a campaign of terror
in which security forces killed perhaps 2,000 Ogoni with many more raped,
injured, tortured or made homeless. The indigenous Ogoni had organised to
resist the ecological destruction of the wetlands they were dependent on, to
demand fair distribution of the profits, and to call for self-determination and
human rights. Saro-Wiwa, as a leading Nigerian writer of Ogoni origin, took a
leading part in this campaign and paid the price.
“Silence Would be Treason” contains Saro-Wiwa’s last letters
and poems from military detention, written to Irish solidarity activist Sister
Majella McCarron. They show a fine mind on trial for his life, organising the
international campaign for the release and finally the lives of the “Ogoni 9”,
strategizing about the future of the struggle against Shell, and living life to
the full. They are gripping, harrowing, at times hilarious and immensely
readable. The letters were donated by Sr Majella to Maynooth Library in 2011,
transcribed and edited by librarian Helen Fallon, African Studies specialist
Íde Corley and social movement researcher Laurence Cox, with a foreword by
environmental activist and writer Nnimmo Bassey.
This book was first published in print form in 2013 by the
non-profit African publisher Daraja together with CODESRIA, the Council for the
Development of Social Science Research in Africa, and supported by Trócaire.
Thanks to Daraja Press it is now available in a new and expanded edition as a
free ebook, which can be downloaded in PDF here or read online here.
The Maynooth Ken Saro-Wiwa collection also includes
digitised versions of the letters, audio archives of interviews with Majella
McCarron, Ken’s brother Owens Wiwa and daughter Noo Saro-Wiwa, a video archive
of related events and other material. The collection is free online here.
The ebook was launched at Maynooth Library today, 14 November 2017 as part of
the 22nd anniversary commemorations of the Ogoni 9 executions, by
Majella McCarron. The keynote talk was given by Mark Dummett, Amnesty
International researcher working on the current court case against Shell in the
Netherlands; Samuel Udogbo, researching MOSOP youth in the Niger Delta; and
Graham Kay, researching the history of how geopolitics came to centre around
oil between 1896 and 1921.
