The recent escalation of the crisis on Bonny Island has been defined by The Guardian as “two communities in conflict: the better educated and paid incomers from outside the delta and the economically marginalised indigenous Ijaw”. Ethnicity plays a major role in Nigerian society, as perfectly pointed out by the blogger of Silent Storm in an Ocean of One. Even if no specific ethnic group has been ever mentioned by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) in its messages, about 10% of the sample’s blogs considers the militants as belonging to the Ijaws, the principal ethnic group in the Niger Delta. The analysis of the balance of power on an ethnic base can be even moved one level down: for example, the discussion following a post of the blog Nigerian Curiosity sheds some light about the role of the single tribes composing the Ijaw community in Bayelsa State.

Considering Nigerian history, a parallel between the struggle of Ken Saro-Wiwa for the rights of the Ogoni people in the Nineties and the militants’ actions nowadays has been often established by the observed blogs. In particular, the switch from Saro-Wiwa’s non-violent methods to the militancy’s violent actions has been considered the consequence of the over-reaction of the Federal Government and its failure in dealing with the Delta issues since the MOSOP (Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People) era, as explained by the blogs Blacklooks and My Views.

The numerous secessionist attempts that punctuate Nigerian history caused 8 out of the 62 observed blogs thinking that the real aim of the militants is the secession of the oil-rich Delta region from the Nigerian federation. Concerns about the spreading of secessionist sentiments outside the Delta are expressed in the interesting discussion following a post by African Shirts.

Among observed Italian dailies, Corriere della Sera made sporadic references to the militants’ ethnicity, while La Repubblica always associated MEND with the Ijaw ethnic group, frequently completing such identification with the adjective “extremely poor” referred to the Ijaws. Terms such as “separatist” and “secessionist” are rarely used by Italian journalists while reporting about Niger Delta militants.

Also BBC News never mentioned alleged secessionist aims of the militancy, and the ethnicity of militants is considered marginal as well.

On the other hand, the considered magazines, with the exclusion of Time, reported about the ethnic characterization of the conflict in the Delta: in particular Vanity Fair’s article is strictly focused on MEND/Ijaws. Time pointed out that “Dokubo-Asari called for the breakup of Nigeria” and “Some of his followers are also mend members”, adding that MEND was interested in influencing Nigerian political processes (“Mend, too, is looking toward the [April 2007] election”).

Finally, Time, Vanity Fair and National Geographic are the only observed mainstream media that analyzed connections between Ken Saro-Wiwa’s campaign and current Delta militancy. 

As a last step in this research, the militants’ definition in the Nigerian blogosphere has been compared to the one provided by the following western media (observed in the same timeframe, i.e. January 2006–July 2007):

• Corriere della Sera and La Repubblica (the two main Italian dailies) websites
• BBC News website
• Time’s reportage by Simon Robinson (May 2006)
• Vanity Fair’s reportage by Sebastian Junger (February 2007)
• National Geographic’s reportage by Tom O’Neill (February 2007)

The huge funding of armed groups in the Delta by NNPC (Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation) recently emerged (via Grandiose Parlor and Naijablog). However backing militancy seems to have been a common practice since a long ago, at least for oil companies: the security report issued for Shell by WAC Global Service in December 2003 stated that: “Contracts are still frequently given as a strategy to quell the most vocal and potentially violent elements in communities.” and “Contracts are still seen as «gifts» to the community rather than as actual contracts.” (page 22). The same situation was witnessed by the blogger of In My Head and Around Me, who highlighted the practice of hiring “ghost workers” by companies in the Delta.

On the other hand, the phenomenon of the funds that companies, institutions and local politicians devolved to militants for “security” reasons went substantially unreported by the observed mainstream media. Only BBC News and Time magazine wrote about the existence of armed groups backed by local politicians in the Delta, acting side by side with the militants.

In addition, the border between “militants” and “criminals” definitions appears blurry: in a previous post of this blog, tag clouds showed that “criminals” was the second most-used term to define militants in the Nigerian blogosphere, while “crime” frequency in the definition of the militants’ actions was quite low. As exemplified by the blog Chima’s Chronicles, where both government and militants are defined “lawless”/”criminals”, this is a linguistic confusion which reflects the complexity of the situation.

Italian media became interested in the Niger Delta soon after the appearance of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), in January 2006, and particularly when, in different episodes, Italian oil workers were kidnapped by militants. A study conducted by the Italian branch of Medecins Sans Frontieres showed how Nigeria, substantially ignored by Italian TVs in 2005, jumped at the fourth place in terms of news coverage in 2006, directly following Middle East, Iraq and Afghanistan crisis.

Both observed Italian dailies, Corriere della Sera and La Repubblica, identified MEND as the leader group amidst Delta militancy. La Repubblica, in particular, drew a clear separation line between MEND and criminal groups.

Also BBC News referred to MEND as the main militant group (even if some feuds between MEND’s factions were repeatedly reported), defining them in opposition to criminal gangs which acted without political goals.

Vanity Fair’s and National Geographic’s reportages were strictly focused on MEND too. Vanity Fair reported also that “Oil companies have long been thought to pay for the allegiance of local youth gangs”. National Geographic, together with BBC News, wrote about an alleged “wide support” of the population towards the militants’ campaign: a confirmation of such support could not be found in the whole of the observed Nigerian blogs.

Previous posts: Step 1/In Vitro; Step 2/Sampling; Step 3/Clouds

Before going deeper in the interpretation of the multifaceted issue of the militancy in the Niger Delta, as it can be derived by the tag clouds elaborated in step 3, let me introduce some comments about the sources of information used by the bloggers belonging to the observed sample.

As shown in the picture above, most quoted mainstream media are respectively BBC News, CNN and Nigerian media (in particular the dailies This Day, Vanguard and The Guardian). It is worth noting how, in about half the cases, the observed blogs quoted mainstream media without linking to the source.
 
“Suddenly breaking news on Cnn has maps pointing at us..” wrote the blog And as I Was Saying…, perfectly summarizing the peak of interest towards the Niger Delta that crossed global newsrooms in 2006.

Another peak was recorded in February 2007, when both CNN and magazines such as Vanity Fair and National Geographic dedicated wide coverage to the Niger Delta: “Nigeria is THE news for today - in particular, the Niger Delta”, as the blog Reflections 2 emphasized it.

In particular the CNN reportage by Jeff Koinange (aired on February 8, 2008) caused immediate criticism and suspects of being staged by both the Nigerian federal government and the militants of MEND. Also the Nigerian blogosphere expressed doubts about the truthfulness of the images broadcasted by CNN, see for example the following posts and comments on the blogs African Shirts and Loomnie. As pointed out by Loomnie, Jeff Koinange was fired by CNN in May 2007 without additional explanations.

The controversy about CNN reportage on the Niger Delta militants epitomizes some of the critical aspects about the typical mainstream media coverage of African issues. In particular:

• global media appear focusing on African events only when western interests are involved. In May 2007 “the thriving trade of kidnapping expatriate seems to have lulled a bit” and, as a consequence, “Port Harcourt is not on CNN breaking news” according to the blog And As I was Saying… Similarly, the blogger of Notes from the Hyena’s Belly observes how the news of a kid’s kidnapping in the Niger Delta reaches out to “BBC and CNN” only if the kid is “supposedly” foreign.
• sensationalism seems to dominate news from Africa (with consequent “unpalatable headlines”, as Akin wrote talking about the Niger Delta issue) as pointed out by this discussion on Grandiose Parlor.
• mainstream media tend to make sweeping generalizations and to consider Africa as a whole, as a “monolithic country, instead of a large, extremely diverse continent” as clearly stated by the blog And As I was Saying… About Nigeria, in particular, “The Delta area is what people relate Nigeria to when they see the news” according to the blog Tobs in Nigeria.

Virtuous interaction between journalists and bloggers, together with citizen journalism and grassroots initiatives, such as the resonance obtained by the Nigerian Proclamation in May 2007, can help in balancing the above described situation.

Previous posts: Step 1/In Vitro; Step 2/Sampling

The sampled Nigerian blogs have been analyzed to point out which terms (and with which frequency) were used by each blog to define:

• the Niger Delta militants;
• their actions;
• the situation in the Niger Delta;
• the other subjects involved in the issue.

Results are shown in form of tag clouds. The calculation of terms’ recurrences is based on the number of blogs (and not of posts): this means that a term used by a single blogger in several posts is in any case represented with a low frequency.

The following tag cloud shows the frequencies of the terms used by the blogs in the sample to define the Niger Delta militants. “Militants” is by far the most used term, followed by “Criminals” (with its variants, such as “Criminal gangs”, “Murderous criminals”, “Self-confessed criminals”, “Efficient criminal industry”) which recurs less than half the times of the previous term. Together on the third step of the podium, “Kidnappers”, “Terrorists” and “Insurgency” show equal frequencies. It’s worth noting that there are several negative definitions used by single blogs and thus represented with low frequency.

The terms used to define the militants’ actions are shown in the next tag cloud: the use of “Kidnapping” is prominent in this case, while the descriptions of both the attacks’ effects (as military actions) and of their objectives (as opportunities to make money) follow with a much lower frequency. The latter are defined as “Business of kidnapping and paying ransoms”, characterized as “Illicit” and “Extremely lucrative”, even called “Big industry”; the former include both a generic definition (“Attacks”) and detailed descriptions of  particular actions, such as “Blow-up installations”, “Raided a police station”, “Detonation of bombs”, “Held hostage Port Harcourt”. “Crime” and “Terrorism” show few recurrences instead.

A smoother distribution, compared with the previous clouds, is shown in the next tag cloud, which is about the situation in the Niger Delta: few terms are used by single blogs and there are small differences in frequency between the most used terms and the others. “Problems/Wahala” and “Crisis” show the highest recurrence, followed by “Violence”. Quite frequent are also terms depicting the region as a “Lawless area”, a “State of anarchy”, or “A terrain of misery” characterized by “Hopeless”, “Marginalization” and “Unemployment problems”.

The following tag cloud is about the other subjects involved in the Niger Delta issue, in particular Delta’s citizens (with “Communities”, “People” and “Indigenes” as the most used terms), foreign workers (defined “Expatriates” and, with halved frequency, “Innocent civilians” and “Hostages”), foreign companies (“Foreign oil multinationals”), federal and local government (most frequent references: “Federal Government” and local “Elites”). It’s worth noting that most of the reported other parties are foreigners, both workers and companies, together with the Federal Government.

Any sort of scientific search needs a sample and the investigation of the Niger Delta militants definition in the Nigerian blogosphere could not escape such rule. Blogs, written by both Nigerian citizens (living in Nigeria or abroad) and Non-Nigerian citizens living in Nigeria, with at least one post concerning the Niger Delta militants posted in the January 2006-July 2007 timeframe, were selected to compose the sample. In the end, 62 blogs matching the requirements were found through:

• the monitoring of the Nigerian Blogs Aggregator via RSS;
• keywords search with Technorati e Google Blogsearch;
• the geographic search among Blogger’s authors.

About the last point, Blogger is by far the most used publishing platform, with over 75% of the sample’s blogs based on it.

Other 88 blogs, belonging to the Nigerian blogosphere, but not to the sample, were identified during the search. So, as a whole, 150 blogs were analyzed (out of the 368 blogs listed on the Nigerian Blog Aggregator in August 2007).

Statistically, within the sample:

• 90% of the bloggers are Nigerian citizens;
• 25% of the bloggers are women (if the analysis is extended to the total of 150 blogs, such percentage rises up to one third);
• 11% of the bloggers are journalists;
• 8% of the bloggers work/worked for the Nigerian federal government or for the multinational oil companies;
• 3% of the bloggers are expatriates working in the Niger Delta;
• about two thirds of the bloggers wrote a single post about the militants.

Stay tuned for next posts.

 

Background and Disclaimer
This is the first of several posts devoted to a research I recently accomplished about the Niger Delta militant groups definition in the Nigerian blogosphere. The prime objective of such research was to check, through the Niger Delta case study, the feasibility of the blogosphere to act (and interact) as a source of information for mainstream media. In some way the blogosphere is already a source of journalistic information, but the typical interaction (particularly in Italian mediasphere) is that mass media sack blogs whenever the need of adding some “colour” to the news is felt. As soon as a crime (bloody enough, of course) is committed, sensational reporting start digging deeper and deeper in all social networks looking for victims/suspects’s profiles…

I am Italian (normally this should not be part of a disclaimer…;). I am not a journalist (but the above-mentioned research about Niger Delta militants was done in the frame of a BA thesis in Communication Sciences). I sacked the blogosphere too, in some way: if the spirit of web 2.0 is “conversation”, I was the guy sat apart who listened, unseen, to the Nigerian bloggers talking about Niger Delta militants (sounds quite unfair, doesn’t it?). Besides the limited time available to conduct the research, the reason for such questionable approach was the choice of using a scientific method: the avoidance of any observer effects becomes then a must. The outcome of this research confirms the value of the blogosphere as an additional, enriching, source of information for the mediasphere and the direct interaction between journalists and bloggers is then suggested as a practice for mainstream media (disclaimer: I already believed in such virtuous interaction, nevertheless some facts to support theories are needed from time to time). Nothing new for most of the bloggers out there, I guess, and no more in vitro observations for me, since the aim of this post, and the following ones, is to allow the observed Nigerian bloggers to be (as a minimum) informed of what happened and (desirably) to join this discussion, in order to criticize and improve the method and the results that will be summarized in the following.

What?
The definition of the Niger Delta militants in the Nigerian blogosphere has been analyzed to find out which terms (and with which frequency) have been used to define the militants, their actions, the Niger Delta context and the other involved subjects.
A comparison has then been established between blogosphere and mediasphere (in particular western and Italian mainstream media) based on some interpretative approaches, which emerged from the aforementioned terms analysis. It’s worth noting that the Niger Delta issue got some attention in the Italian media basically due to the presence of Italian workers among the militants’ hostages.

When?
The timeframe in which the Nigerian blogosphere observation occurred was January 2006 (first attacks claimed by the Militants for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta) through July 2007 (apparent change in militants’ strategy), with some exceptions in order to include meaningful posts written outside such timeframe.

Who?
For the purposes of this research, the Nigerian blogosphere has been considered as composed by:

• blogs written by Nigerians, both living in Nigeria and abroad
• blogs written by Non-Nigerians living in Nigeria.

62 blogs, for a total of 123 posts, matched the requirements (i.e. they belong to the Nigerian blogosphere and they wrote about the Niger Delta militants in the selected timeframe):

Africa Unchained, African Shirts, Agodi News, Aijuswanarite, Akin, Alternative Approach, And as I was saying, A Penny for My Thoughts?…Make It a Million, Ayoola in Lagos, Aziza Uko, Black Looks, Brosdee’s View, Casmirjomecblog, Chima’s Chronicle, Chippla’s Weblog, Chxta’s world, El sonido de mi voz, Endi’s World, Exploring the Realities of Events, Grandiose Parlor, Ijebuman’s Diary, In My Head & Around Me, Jail Peter Odili, Laughing and Learning in Lanka, Life’s a Beach, Linda Ikeji, Loomnie, Molue Talk, Musings of a Naijaman, MySpace: Blood Oil Nigeria, MySpace: Brian, MySpace: Olokuntogun Ifasehun, My Views, Naijablog, News, Niger Delta and Conflicts in Nigeria, Niger Delta Watch, Nigerian Curiosity, Nigerian Politics, Nigerian Times, Notes from the Hyena’s Belly, Omoluwabi Okebadan, On a Lighter Mode, Oyibo!, Pamela’s World, Pause to Ponder, Reflections 2, Richard Animan Golf, Stock Market Nigeria, Sub-Saharan African Roundtable, Tayo’s Files, The Anderson’s African Adventure, The Afro Beat, The Plights of Activists in Nigeria, There Was, There Is and There Will Be, The World According to Adaure, Thy Glory O Nigeria, Tobs in Nigeria, Upwardly Mobile, Vera Ikeji, View from Inside the Box, Wetin Dey Happen?

If you find your blog listed here is just to allow the pingback mechanism to act as an invitation for you to join the discussion. Note: some of the above blogs are no more available to public access, so they will not be quoted in future posts.

Where?
The attached picture shows the location of the analyzed blogs. It’s interesting to note that only about 10% of the considered bloggers live in the Niger Delta, whereas from a demographic standpoint more than 20% of Nigerian citizens populate the region.

Why?
I believe in a “pro-am” approach, as clearly outlined by Jay Rosen, as the paradigm for the short-term future of journalism: professionals and bloggers (or whatever blog could evolve into) cooperate to provide wider and deeper coverage.

In particular, the analysis of the Niger Delta militants definition in the Nigerian blogosphere highlighted the following advantages compared to the traditional mainstream media reports:

• eye witness accounts shedding light over particular aspects of the issue;
• deeper discussion over the causes and the context of what can be considered a multifaceted phenomenon;
• catching the “newslore” or the collective feelings that always accompany an event or a series of events but that not so often succeed in filtering into the news.

Un immigrato irregolare di origini nigeriane, Osamuyia Aikpitanhi di 23 anni, é morto lo scorso 9 giugno a bordo di un volo Iberia che avrebbe dovuto riportarlo in modo coatto a Lagos. La morte, ufficialmente, é stata causata da un arresto cardiaco, ma accuse di maltrattamenti sono state mosse agli agenti della polizia spagnola che accompagnavano il clandestino e che lo avrebbero lasciato ammanettato, imbavagliato e incappucciato durante il volo. La protesta é subito divampata attraverso la blogosfera nigeriana e ha portato a una giornata di dimostrazioni di fronte alle ambasciate spagnole in diversi paesi (nella foto di Adeola Aderounmu, la lettera di protesta consegnata all’ambasciata spagnola di Stoccolma).

Nel frattempo due sindacati francesi hanno chiesto ad Air France-KLM di sospendere l’uso dei voli di linea per il rimpatrio forzato degli immigrati illegali. Tali rimpatri avvengono infatti con metodi che sono spesso lesivi della dignità e dei diritti fondamentali degli immigrati e, secondo i sindacati, alla lunga possono arrecare un danno di immagine alla compagnia aerea. I maltrattamenti inflitti ai clandestini hanno persino portato in passato a diverbi tra i passeggeri e gli agenti di polizia.

In Italia i rimpatri coatti sono avvenuti sia con voli di linea Alitalia che con charter dedicati e con velivoli militari da trasporto. Sebbene ad oggi non siano riportate segnalazioni di maltrattamenti nei confronti dei clandestini a bordo degli aerei italiani, una scorsa al Rapporto Annuale 2007 di Amnesty International evidenzia come le pratiche usate nella detenzione ed espulsione di immigrati irregolari, ancora ben lontane dagli standard fissati dal diritto internazionale, rappresentino il nocciolo del problema degli abusi di potere in Italia.

Con un comunicato di una paginetta (web), il Ministero dell’Interno riporta le principali conclusioni del rapporto sull’immigrazione 2006 pubblicato dall’OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development; OCSE secondo la dizione italiana). La sintesi ministeriale è piuttosto imprecisa, come vedremo nel dettaglio. Lascia inoltre perplessi il passaggio circolare di informazioni sempre più approssimative cui si assiste, con il Ministero dell’Interno che fornisce i propri dati all’OCSE, la quale li incorpora nel proprio rapporto globale, le cui conclusioni sono riprese dal Ministero stesso.

Per quanto riguarda la stima della popolazione complessiva di immigrati regolari presenti in Italia nel 2005, il Ministero, pur nella stringatezza del comunicato, riesce ad introdurre due cifre diverse: 3 milioni e 2,7 milioni di persone. Di queste, la prima cifra non compare affatto nel rapporto OCSE, che invece riprende i dati del rapporto annuale ISTAT (si veda la tabella in alto), il quale si basa sui dati provenienti dall’anagrafe. D’altro canto, il Dossier Statistico sull’Immigrazione 2006 curato dalla Caritas italiana, partendo da un dato ufficiale di 2.271.680 immigrati registrati (basata sul numero di permessi di soggiorno rilasciati al 1 gennaio 2006), finisce con lo stimare una popolazione di circa 3 milioni di immigrati regolari per il 2005. La differenza è dovuta al fatto che i minori con età inferiore ai 14 anni non dispongono di un permesso di soggiorno proprio, essendo registrati sul permesso di soggiorno di uno o di entrambi i genitori, e quindi non rientrerebbero nel computo. La cifra di 3 milioni di abitanti immigrati, che il Ministero dell’Interno erroneamente attribuisce al rapporto OCSE, appare quindi la più ragionevole. (Ad essere precisi, il rapporto OCSE, specificando la provenienza dei dati usati, avverte con un’ opportuna nota del rischio che il totale sia sottostimato per la ragione appena spiegata).

Nel variegato panorama dei fenomeni migratori, l’accoglienza dei rifugiati politici porta sempre con sé un’implicita valenza virtuosa per lo stato ospitante. Appare quindi ottimistico il tono con cui il comunicato ministeriale annuncia la stabilità delle richieste di asilo politico in Italia, a fronte di una generale flessione negli altri paesi (-15%). Viene omesso però il fatto, ben puntualizzato nel rapporto OCSE, che l’Italia abbia un numero di richieste di asilo politico in proporzione al totale della popolazione tra i più bassi in Europa.

Viceversa, i numeri sull’immigrazione illegale, a causa della percezione negativa cui il fenomeno è associato, vengono passati in sordina. Il comunicato del Ministero dell’Interno, ambiguamente, riporta la sola cifra di 22.000 immigrati illegali fermati lungo le nostre coste. Il dato proviene dal rapporto OCSE, in cui si specifica però che questi 22.000 clandestini rappresentano la fetta più piccola (14%) di tutti gli immigrati irregolari fermati dalle forze dell’ordine, i quali ammontano a circa 157.000 persone.

Se, per finire, il povero blogger tentasse di distillare da tutti i rapporti precedentemente citati un numero univoco che quantifichi il flusso migratorio legale in ingresso nel paese, rimarrebbe sopraffatto dai demoni della demografia, della statistica e dell’imprecisione.
Il rapporto OCSE stabilisce che il flusso di immigrati regolari permanenti (e quindi escludendo i permessi di soggiorno a breve termine) in Italia equivalga a 184.300 persone per il 2005. Un confronto con i dati del 2004 (153.100 immigrati permanenti che diventano 319.300 includendo gli immigrati temporanei), porta a calcolare un totale di 380.000 individui in entrata (inclusi gli immigrati temporanei). Entrambi i numeri appaiono lontani dalla variazione della popolazione di immigrati residenti in Italia tra il 2004 e il 2005 (+268.300 persone, si veda sempre la tabella in apertura).
L’ISTAT si avvicina di più al bersaglio: basandosi infatti sui dati di iscrizione all’anagrafe, calcola che il flusso migratorio in ingresso sia pari a 282.780 persone per il 2005. Sottraendo il corrispondente flusso migratorio in uscita dal paese (15.951 persone) si ottiene un flusso netto di 266.829 individui.
Resta da capire dove vadano a finire gli effetti dell’incremento demografico della popolazione immigrata: il saldo per il 2005 tra nascite e morti ammonta a +48.838 individui secondo l’ISTAT. Un numero, quest’ultimo, comunque difficile da conciliare con le 52.000 nascite di figli di cittadini stranieri stimate dalla Caritas nello stesso periodo. Se a questo punto vi è venuto mal di testa, sappiate di essere in buona compagnia…

Chi: io
Cosa: mostra collettiva Gemine Muse 2007, “Tra arte e polis: le visioni possibili”
Come: “Cj”, sei fotografie sul tema del Citizen Journalism
Dove: Palazzo Moroni, Padova
Quando: inaugurazione venerdì 20 Aprile 2007 ore 18. La mostra resterà allestita fino al 1˚ Luglio 2007.
Perchè: gli impatti concreti del cosiddetto “Citizen Journalism” sul modo di fare informazione iniziano a farsi sentire oltre oceano; in Italia prevale ancora la teoria e qualche sporadica iniziativa dei mainstream media, per lo più di facciata. Le fotografie del progetto “Cj” sono pensate per sollecitare i giornalisti e in questo senso sono collocate in un luogo strategico: il pianerottolo che conduce alle sale conferenza stampa del municipio di Padova, un po’ la sala d’attesa per chi fa informazione locale. E come in ogni sala d’attesa che si rispetti ci vuole qualcosa da sfogliare, anche distrattamente: da qui l’idea di lasciare in consultazione le sei immagini, con relative citazioni usate come didascalia, rilegate in un album. Per gettare il piccolo seme del dubbio che le sale per le conferenze stampa non esisteranno per sempre. O almeno non saranno più quello che sono oggi: il luogo di incontro tra professionisti, professionisti della politica da una parte, della comunicazione dall’altra. Le tecnologie digitali, e soprattutto l’uso che la gente sceglie di farne, più o meno consapevolmente, hanno mandato in frantumi questo connubio. La conversazione è esplosa e i frammenti si sono sparsi tutto attorno, per così dire.

Giornalisti a rischio in Messico: Un altro giornalista messicano risulta scomparso nel nulla dal 20 gennaio scorso, secondo un copione ormai consolidato e costruito attorno a pochi elementi fissi: un giornale o una radio locale di una città del Messico, un’inchiesta sui traffici illeciti (droga, prostituzione, clandestini), un giornalista ammazzato o fatto sparire, una impunità di fatto per mandanti ed esecutori. Rodolfo Rincón Taracena, reporter del quotidiano locale Tabasco Hoy, stava indagando sul traffico di droga a Villahermosa: ha fatto in tempo a vedere pubblicata l’ultima sua inchiesta e la sera stessa è scomparso. Secondo il rapporto annuale di Reporters sans Frontieres, il caso di Rodolfo Rincón Taracena va ad aggiungersi ad altre tre sparizioni di giornalisti avvenute in analoghe circostanze: Rafael Ortiz Martínez, del quotidiano Zócalo di Moclova (stato di Coahuila) scomparso l’ 8 luglio 2006; Guevara Guevara Domínguez, responsabile del settimanale on-line Siglo 21, scomparso l’8 ottobre 2006 mentre indagava al confine tra gli stati di Durango e di Chihuahua; José Antonio García Apac, del settimanale Ecos de la Cuenca, scomparso il 20 novembre 2006 nello stato di Michoacán. A questi si aggiungono i nove giornalisti messicani uccisi nel corso del 2006, sei dei quali ammazzati in soli tre mesi, tra ottobre e dicembre.

Energia in Nigeria: Questione di punti di vista: nel nord del mondo si pensa a come affrancare le società dal petrolio e dalle altre fonti di energia altamente inquinanti. Nella Nigeria dell’OPEC la stessa prospettiva appare inquietante, almeno quanto essere chiusi nella stessa stanza con un gorilla da 500 libbre. “Difficilmente ci sarà un rimpiazzo totale dei carburanti fossili, ma ci sono buone possibilità che nel campo dell’energia si faccia qualche scoperta dirompente che avvierà in una spirale discendente il prezzo del petrolio.” - analizza Omodudu - “Siamo preparati a questo scenario? […] Per essere una nazione la cui economia è così legata al settore energetico, il dibattito su questi argomenti è penosamente assente.” D’altra parte in uno dei commenti si evidenzia come “fonti di energia alternative e rinnovabili (come il sole) sono positive perchè elimineranno la dipendenza dei cittadini dalla PHCN.” [Power Holding Company of Nigeria, l’agenzia energetica nazionale nigeriana, ndr]

Il cammino verso lo smembramento e la privatizzazione della PHCN sembra procedere senza una chiara visione strategica. Naijablog prevede che “i Nigeriani non avranno più a che fare con un grande e inefficiente monopolio nazionale, bensì con molti monopoli, uno per ogni specifico settore energetico” senza introdurre quel minimo di competizione tra i diversi fornitori di elettricità che avrebbe potuto migliorare il servizio erogato al consumatore.

L’unica certezza che resta ai Nigeriani è quella dei frequenti black-out. A tal proposito, Oluniji David Ajao commenta amaramente la fornitura di 80 MegaWatt che il governo nigeriano ha promesso al Ghana: “Non mi crea problemi il fatto che la Nigeria aiuti il Ghana. No davvero. Tuttavia, trovo questa notizia ironica per il fatto che la mancanza di corrente elettrica non è più un evento eccezionale ma è ormai diventata la norma in Nigeria”.

Allo stesso tempo, ci pensa African Architecture ad alimentare le preoccupazioni di Omodudu riguardo un futuro indipendente dal petrolio: viene da un’altra nazione ricca di pozzi petroliferi, il Texas, l’idea di riciclare le piattaforme di trivellazione off-shore in disarmo per creare centrali eoliche galleggianti. “Non so quante piattaforme di trivellazione giacciano sprecate nel Golfo del Benin, al largo delle coste del delta del Niger, ma queste strutture potrebbero essere ben riciclate. Vi si potrebbero installare generatori eolici per fornire corrente elettrica alle comunità costiere della regione del delta”. Le piattaforme in disarmo ci sono; resta da vedere se i venti sono favorevoli come al largo del Texas, dove soffiano con più forza proprio durante le ore più calde del giorno, quando la richiesta di corrente (e il suo prezzo) sono più elevati.