Delta Nigeria: The Rape of Paradise. George Osodi, Trolley Books, 2008, 248 pages, 200 color illustrations, hardcover, ISBN: 978-1-904563-85-3, UK £24.99 \ US $49.95 \ EURO €39.95 \ CAN $54.95.
Publisher’s description:
Oil was discovered in the Niger Delta in the 1950s, and soon after a powerful international oil industry developed. Nigeria today is the world’s 5th largest exporter to the US. However the people are poor that live in this oil-rich land, and the environment that surrounds them is deadly – oil leaks and explosions abound, whilst the water supply is heavily contaminated.
In recent years, local guerillas in balaclavas and speed boats and armed with enormous rounds of ammunition have taken on the oil companies. They demand the right to live in their own clean and unpolluted land, that damage is restored to the delicate delta environment and stake a 50% claim on all oil pumped out of the creeks.
These dramatic images document for the first time the extent of the environmental damage, revealing not only to the world, but also to Nigeria itself, what exactly is happening to their country, where everything is being taken from this land – and nothing is being given back to the people.
George Osodi is a Nigerian photographer from Lagos. His photographs range between photojournalism and artistic documentary, closely observing social, economic and ecological processes of exploitation. George Osodi was chosen to be part of the prestigious Documenta art fair in 2007.
