2026 Ogoni Day: Group Tasks Local Farmers on Continued Agriculture Activities

Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt

Despite ongoing challenges of decades of polluted environment, a non-governmental organisation, Lekeh Development Foundation, has encouraged local farmers in Ogoniland to continue with their agricultural activities, thereby helping in solving the problem of food security.

Executive Director of the foundation, Friday Nbani made the call yesterday, in commemoration of the 2026 Ogoni Day held in Bori, Khana Local Government Area of Rivers State.

Addressing farmers from different LGAs in Ogoniland, Nbani expressed sadness that over 30 years after the murder of Ken Saro-Wiwa and other Ogoni environmental activists, the area is still suffering serious environment degradation.

He said the event is a sacred day of remembrance and resilience, saying that they stand not as victims of the past but as architects of the future.

Nbani said “Thirty-one years ago, Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni Nine gave their lives so that we might breathe clean air, drink pure water, and walk on soil that belongs to us and our children and today, their blood still cries out from the earth, demanding that we finish what they started.

“The oil has poisoned our land, the injustice has scattered our people, and the silence of the world has tested our spirit, but look around you: we are still here, we are still fighting, and we are still rising.

“Every mangrove we replant is an act of defiance, every young Ogoni who refuses to forget is a living monument, every voice raised for environmental justice echoes the courage of those who came before us.

“This is not just our struggle, it is the struggle of every community worldwide that refuses to let profit triumph over people, that refuses to let development mean destruction, that refuses to let tomorrow’s children inherit a wasteland.”

According to him, they do not simply remember; but that the Ogonis recommit, rebuild, reclaim, and roar with one voice, stressing that “Ogoni will rise, our land will heal, and justice, though delayed, will never be denied.”

He stated: “As Director of Lekeh Development Foundation, I stand before you today not with empty promises but with evidence of what we can accomplish when we transform pain into purpose and anger into action.

“We have seen our young people reclaim their futures through skills training and entrepreneurship, we have witnessed our farmers cultivate hope from contaminated soil through sustainable agriculture programs, and we have watched our communities organise, mobilise, and demand accountability from those who profit from our resources while leaving us with pollution and poverty.

“The work of Lekeh Development Foundation is the work of Ogoni survival and revival every scholarship we award is a seed of leadership, every environmental cleanup we support is a reclamation of our birthright, every health initiative we implement is a declaration that Ogoni lives matter.”

Nbani continued: “We cannot do this alone; we need every son and daughter of Ogoniland, at home and in the diaspora, to join this movement, to invest in our collective future, to refuse to let the legacy of our martyrs fade into history books while our rivers still run black with oil.

“Together, through organisations like ours and through the indomitable spirit of our people, we are not just surviving we are building an Ogoniland where development means dignity, where progress means protection of our environment, and where the dreams of Ken Saro-Wiwa finally become the reality we all deserve.

“As your Farmer Coordinator, I speak to you with soil under my fingernails and the sun on my back, representing every man and woman who refuses to abandon the land our ancestors gave us, no matter how poisoned it has become.

“They told us our farms were finished, that nothing would grow here again, that we should forget about cassava and yams and accept handouts instead of harvests—but we proved them wrong, because Ogoni farmers are not just cultivators of crops, we are cultivators of resistance, and every seed we plant is an act of faith in our future.”

He further said that through collaborative farming, organic methods, and the sharing of indigenous knowledge, no oil company can destroy our land, “we are teaching our youth that there is dignity in agriculture, that food security is freedom, and that the hands that feed our communities are the hands that will heal our land. “

“Yes, the challenges are enormous contaminated water sources, degraded soil, lack of government support, and the constant threat of further environmental destruction but when I see the Ogoni farmers network producing abundant harvests, when I watch young people returning to agriculture with new techniques and old wisdom, when I taste vegetables grown in soil, we have rehabilitated ourselves, I know that our struggle is bearing fruit,” he added.

He however, called on the farmers “to hold your hoes as high as any protest sign, to recognise that every meal we produce from this land is a victory against those who wanted us dependent and defeated, and to understand that true liberation will come not just from corporate compensation or government promises, but from our own hands reclaiming the earth, feeding our families, and proving that Ogoni soil, like Ogoni spirit, can never be permanently destroyed”.