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[auriea]

JULY 13, 20:48 ET
<b>Nigerian Women Stick to Oil Demands</b>

By D'ARCY DORAN
Associated Press Writer
AP/Saurabh Das [23K]
http://wire.ap.org/APnews/center_story.html?FRONTID=AFRICA&STORYID=APIS7KOCKIO0&IMAGEID=303392

ESCRAVOS, Nigeria (AP) ‹ Oil company executives thumped the table and 
even offered concessions, but the women who took over a giant oil 
terminal and trapped hundreds of workers inside did not budge 
Saturday in their demands for jobs for their sons and electricity for 
their homes.

Tempers flared during the talks held in a sweltering village of rusty 
tin shacks only 100 yards from the looming concrete terminal, where 
700 employees ‹ including Americans, Britons, Canadians and Nigerians 
‹ have been trapped for six days.

``I've put everything on the table that I am prepared to give,'' 
ChevronTexaco representative Dick Filgate declared at one point. ``I 
want Escravos back. I want the ladies off the site.''

At another point, the American oil executive pounded his fist on the 
table when he was interrupted by a young man. Then a representative 
of the village chief intervened by warning, ``In our culture, only 
the chief pounds the table.''

As many as 600 women from villages around the terminal took over the 
multinational Escravos plant on Monday, saying they want the company 
to hire their sons and use some of the region's oil riches to develop 
their remote, rundown communities.

Nigeria is the world's sixth-largest oil exporter ‹ and the 
fifth-biggest supplier of U.S. oil imports ‹ in major part because of 
the vast reserves of the Niger Delta here. Yet the people in the 
Niger Delta are among the country's poorest.

Unarmed but unbudging, the women have blocked access to the helipad, 
airstrip and docks that provide the only exits for the facility, 
which is surrounded by rivers and swamps.

ChevronTexaco officials said Saturday some of the women's 23 demands 
would take time to fulfill, while others ‹ such as a demand to build 
80,000 houses ‹ were unrealistic. But they said they were prepared to 
keep negotiating.

The talks took place in a community center in Ugborodo village. Amid 
frustrated outbursts, women and oil company executives often spoke 
cordially.

``I can't give you everything on the list but I am prepared to 
continue the dialogue,'' Filgate, general manager of asset management 
for ChevronTexaco's Nigeria subsidiary, told the women, some in 
bright flowered dresses.

The peaceful protest by unarmed women is a departure for Nigeria, 
where such disputes often are settled with machetes and guns. In the 
oil-rich Niger Delta, armed young men routinely resort to kidnapping 
and sabotage to pressure oil multinationals into giving them jobs, 
protection money or compensation for alleged environmental damage.

Hostages generally are released unharmed.

The women, from the Ugborodo and Arutan communities, want 
ChevronTexaco to provide water, electricity, schools and clinics for 
their villages. They complained that previous company promises to 
transform the villages into modern towns had not been realized.

Ugborodo is without electricity, except for a community-owned 
gasoline generator supplying sporadic power to a few.

Late Saturday, Anunu Uwawah, a protest leader, said the talks had 
made progress, including a pledge by ChevronTexaco to help the women 
establish fish and poultry farms to supply food to the terminal.

But the women were disappointed the company had not firmly agreed to 
hire village men.

``If they signed an agreement today, we would leave the yard 
tomorrow,'' Uwawah said. ``But it is not happening.''

In the terminal airfield, two dozen women danced in the rain 
alongside four helicopters and a plane, chanting: ``This is our 
land.''

Talks were expected to continue Sunday.

Filgate said it took time to develop the swampy region, where 
Nigeria's government has provided little infrastructure.

``Right now I can say we can hook you up to electricity. We have done 
it in other villages ... but it's difficult, it takes a long time to 
figure out how to do it,'' he said.

``Recognize that we can only do so much. You've given me a list of 22 
items. As for water supply, we will help you with water supply, and 
we are also very much in favor of education.''

The oil giant also would look into demands that ChevronTexaco help 
reverse the erosion of riverbanks surrounding the villages, Filgate 
said. The women said the erosion had worsened in recent years after 
the company began dredging nearby rivers for soil to build a gas 
plant.

``But this can't be done in three months' time,'' Filgate said.

Delta state police commissioner John Ahmadu said Saturday he hoped 
the standoff would soon end in a peaceful and orderly way. ``I don't 
foresee a problem,'' he said.

On Wednesday, about 100 police and soldiers armed with assault rifles 
were sent to the terminal to protect the facility, but they had 
orders not to harm the women.

A ChevronTexaco spokesman said Wednesday the protest would not affect 
the facility's July production quota.

The struggle between international oil firms and local communities 
drew international attention in the mid-1990s, when violent protests 
by the tiny Ogoni tribe forced Shell to abandon its wells on their 
land.

The late dictator Gen. Sani Abacha responded in 1995 by hanging nine 
Ogoni leaders, including writer Ken Saro Wiwa ‹ triggering 
international outrage and Nigeria's expulsion from the Commonwealth, 
an organization of Britain and its former colonies.