The Execution of the Ogoni Nine

On 10 November 1995 the writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other Ogoni leaders, Saturday Dobee, Nordu Eawo, Daniel Gbooko, Paul Levera, Felix Nuate, Baribor Bera, Barinem Kiobel and John Kpuine, were hanged by the military government of General Sani Abacha and buried in Port Harcourt (Wikipedia). They had opposed the practices of the Royal Dutch Shell oil company in the Niger Delta through the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP).

They were convicted of inciting the murder of four Ogoni chiefs in May 1994. Wikipedia records that, according to Amnesty International, the government blamed MOSOP for those murders without presenting evidence, and that at least two witnesses later retracted their testimony against Saro-Wiwa, alleging that they had been paid and offered jobs by Shell to give false evidence.

From 1990 Ken Saro-Wiwa devoted most of his time to the Ogoni people of the Niger Delta, whose land had been the site of oil extraction since the 1950s and suffered severe environmental damage (Wikipedia). The Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) drew up the Ogoni Bill of Rights, demanding greater autonomy for the Ogoni, a fair share of the proceeds of oil, and repair of the damage to Ogoni land. In May 1994 four Ogoni chiefs known to oppose MOSOP were murdered, and the government blamed the movement (Wikipedia).

The executions provoked international condemnation, and Nigeria was increasingly treated as a pariah state until Abacha's death in 1998 (Wikipedia).

Saro-Wiwa had been vice-chairman of the General Assembly of the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization from 1993 to 1995. According to Wikipedia's article on him, his execution triggered international outrage and led to Nigeria's suspension from the Commonwealth for more than three years.