The Mysterious Case of Enugu, Niger Delta’s Almost Doppelganger
The Niger Delta area in the south of Nigeria is famous.
It is regularly in the news and has been a constant topic of discussion and heated debate.
When the Niger Delta is mentioned, what readily comes to mind?
Crude oil, oil spillages, environmental hazards, militants’ armed struggle for better policies, and, of course, the revered answer of all things — money.
Money for bribery and indigene settlements among others.
Our beloved Enugu, the Coal City State, would have been a lot like the Niger Delta but for a little, or shall we say a huge, saving grace.
The major difference?
In Enugu, it would not be crude oil birthing all these controversies, but something else, something quite indigenous and historical to Enugu: COAL
This beautiful mass of compressed carbon trapped with energy that continues to serve millions to date.
A little sojourn into how the Enugu journey would have occurred:
In 1909, during a wild adventure in the search of silver on Enugu’s soil, a British engineer, Albert Kitson discovered coal in Enugu at the Udi Ridge. Mining of this much-desired mineral started in the area and soon after, in 1914, a large shipment of coal left Enugu to the United Kingdom.
From then on, other mines were opened up by the capitalism driven, business savvy British government in Enugu, and serious commercial mining of coal commenced. Alas, this did not last for long.
The discovery of coal brought about large scale mining, which required a lot of miners and labor force. This meant mass immigration and settlement of these workers, and their families, in the area.
With the increase in population, there was an increase in demand for goods and services, which fostered the growth of numerous businesses in the area.
As time passed, commerce grew and thrived. Thus, Enugu became the commercial hub of the East and, in 1917, it had already achieved town status. In 1938, it became the capital of the Eastern Region.
This brief foray into the history of Enugu state shows the great importance of coal in the olden days.
Coal was the major source of energy for the world then, as crude oil is today. Coal powered transportation like trains, ships, and even some cars known as steam-powered road-locomotives.
However, the first and second industrial revolutions, believed to have begun around the mid-eighteenth century to the early twentieth century, were the turning point in human history.
Men went from hand production methods to the use of machines and the manufacturing of more sophisticated technology and finer and lighter fuel, all of which have led to the remarkably developed technological world we exist in today.
The industrial revolution, according to economic historians, is the most important event in the history of humanity since the domestication of animals and plants, and this revolution, quite intriguingly, had its entire energy sourced from coal.
However, it was not until the mid-1950s that the world made the transition from coal to petroleum. Had this never happened, as many experts reason, crude oil would never really have become relevant.
Coal would have remained the major source of energy for the world; and the mining of coal in Enugu would have evolved, and thus put the environment in jeopardy, just as is prevalent in the Niger Delta.
But would coal have reached the evolution of its crude oil counterpart, or would it have remained on the edges of self-extinction?
As garnered from official records and anecdotal evidence, even before major coal mining operations slowed down in Enugu, a resemblance of the Niger Delta strife was already brewing and visible in certain areas.
First was the environmental degradation. The mining of coal has a very far-reaching impact on the environment in which it is practiced and even recent studies are still reporting on its impact.
A large expanse of land is required with lots of digging and the utilization of heavy machinery. The waste products from mining activities, unfortunately, have to be dumped somewhere. Also, dust and noise emanating from the operations led to the contamination of the air, water bodies and soil of surrounding areas.
There were about five functional mines in Enugu state, with production at Onyeama, Ekulu, Ogbete, Iva Valley and Okpara that reached an estimated 583,422 tons with Enugu producing more than any other state in Nigeria. The effects on the environment were massive and would certainly have worsened had mining continued or increased pace.
Furthermore, there arose a lot of crises from workers’ dissatisfaction with mining pay and standards. Noteworthy among them is the Iva Valley Massacre, which occurred on the 18th of November, 1949; aptly depicted in the sculpted monument at New Market roundabout, which shows the shooting and killing of unarmed men by the military.
According to historical reports, it started as an industrial dispute between the workers and management, which resulted in an intervention by the government.
At that time, the country was witnessing an inflation in the prices of goods. As a result, the miners demanded increased wages. They had previously made this request, alongside the recognition of their trade union, the Colliery Workers Union, since early 1944. But the management was not forthcoming.
In November 1949, the workers embarked on a work-to-rule strike, which mandated that no worker was to work longer than the daily minimum hours, or produce more than the daily minimum amount in the terms of their employment.
This drastically affected the productivity of the mines. Just three days into the strike, the management responded by sacking 200 workers. The sacked workers refused to leave.
Their wives, a throng of aggrieved and resolute women, embarked on a protest in the administrative building of the mine, where they broke windows and equipment. The police were called in and a lot of women ended up injured. The colonial government viewed these protests as part of the Zikist movement for independence and sought to evacuate the mine’s explosives before the protesters took them.
Nine hundred policemen and soldiers, armed to the teeth, were sent to cull the protest. It did not end well. Twenty men were killed and fifty-one were badly injured. A great blood loss that the city mourns to date.
Consider this perspective and the repercussions in Nigeria today as we know it.
Would Eastern Nigeria be a more unified stakeholder in the Nigerian political landscape of today if coal was still a major source of income for the country?
If the clamors for an independent Biafra had succeeded, would we have a Rwanda version of functioning region and Enugu a modern Kigali? or would things have worsened?
And there you have it. The reason Enugu, a land of opportunity and mineral resources, isn’t like the Niger Delta today is because the world switched its focus from coal to oil.
Had this not happened, the environmental degradation would have been terrible; the government and mining firms, as history continues to show into the present, would have been complacent.
The debate would rage on, constantly and consistently. There would have been the never-ending channels of monetary settlements.
The state might not have bothered to look for ways to generate more revenue rather than massive borrowing, and Enugu youths would have picked up arms to become militants. They still seem to already have.
Who do you think would have been our Asari Dokubo?
