AN ASSESSMENT OF NIGERIAN NEWSPAPERS’ COVERAGE OF THE NIGER DELTA
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Background to the Study
The Niger Delta region of Nigeria is very strategic to the country‟s economic and political existence. This is explained by the fact that the country‟s oil resources which account for 90 per cent of her foreign exchange earnings and about 80 per cent of the budgetary revenue, come from the area (Nigeria Economy Profile, 2012). Misconceptions and controversies had earlier trailed the definition of the area referred to as the Niger Delta. These misconceptions and controversies stemmed from the discovery of crude oil at Olibiri, in present Bayelsa State in commercial quantities in 1958. However, the Niger Delta as currently defined is synonymous with the oil producing areas in the country. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo who in his bill creating the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), listed the nine oil producing states of Abia, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Cross Rivers, Delta, Edo, Imo, Rivers and Ondo as member states of the region. NDDC (2000:1) in its definition of the area states: “the Niger Delta region traverses nine out of the 36 states making up the Federal Republic of Nigeria. These are: Abia, Akwa Ibom, Bayesla, Cross River, Delta, Edo, Imo, Ondo and Rivers State”. Alamieyeseigha (2005) also subscribes to this definition by observing that the Niger Delta in its present form covers these states. But flaws in the above definition and description of the area are made bare by historical account. Onduku (2001:3) notes that: The Niger Delta as a region predates Nigeria‟s emergence as a British Colony by at least a decade. Britain‟s Niger Delta Protectorate and the Niger Delta Coast Protectorate were already well established by the middle of 1880s and 2 the late 1890s before further British interests led to the formation of Southern Nigeria in 1900. Alagoa (1979) and Ekeh (2004) give credence to this view when they affirm that the Niger Delta dates back to around 1480s, during the period of Portuguese exploration of the West Coast of Africa. According to Ekeh “the Portuguese were a sea faring people and mostly stayed in the rivers and creeks of the Niger Delta once they reached coastline of what we now know as the Niger Delta.” However, for the purpose of this study, the definition of the Niger Delta has been limited to the following states: Delta, Bayelsa, Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Cross Rivers and Edo States with a population of over 45 million people distributed in over 1600 communities (NPC, 2006). The area has some unique characteristics, which tend to make development difficult. It is, for instance, one of the largest wetlands in the world. It covers an area of 70,000 square kilometres and is noted for its sandy coastal ridge barriers, brackish or saline mangroves, freshwater, permanent and seasonal swamp forests as well as lowland rainforest. The whole area is traversed and crisscrossed by a large number of rivers, rivulets, streams, canals and creeks. The coastal line is buffeted throughout the year by the tides of the Atlantic Ocean while the mainland is subjected to regimes of flood by the various rivers, particularly the river Niger. By this, the Niger Delta region is the second largest delta in the world and the largest wetland in Africa
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