British Academy: The UK's National Academy for the Humanities and Social Sciences
14TH BRITISH ACADEMY POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWSHIP SYMPOSIUM
Abstract
The Chief, the Youth and the Plantation: Resource Politics in Rural Nigeria
Dr Pauline von Hellermann
Local politics in Southern Nigeria are shaped by contestations over access to and control over resources, frequently resulting in tensions between an existing leadership and the so-called 'Youth'. In recent years in particular, many local chiefs have been deposed. This happened in the town of Udo in Edo State, where, in June 2006, the ruling Chief Uwangue was effectively imprisoned in his palace, and 'the Youth' took control of the town. Several factors led to his disposal, but a central issue in the conflict was the Uwangue's increasing control over contracts with a nearby expatriate managed oil palm and rubber plantation, which have become very sought after. In general, town and plantation politics are closely interwoven, with the plantation itself affected by local politics; its Belgian managing director, too, had to leave in June 2006. Focusing on the events of summer 2006, this paper explores how this large expatriate plantation has become an integral part of local resource politics.
Before starting a Marie-Curie Research Fellowship with the HEEAL (Historical Ecologies of East African Landscapes) project in the Department of Archaeology at the University of York in January 2008, Dr von Hellermann was a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Sussex, working on colonial and postcolonial forest resource politics in Southern Nigeria. She has written and published several articles, and is currently finishing her book manuscript, Things Fall Apart? A Political Ecology of Forest Policy in Southern Nigeria.