Delta Dignitaries

The journey from Abuja was exhausting, involving a flight to Port Harcourt, a 5am start for a 3 hour drive and then an hour on a little wooden boat, penetrating deep into the heart of the Niger Delta (AKA: ‘Kidnap Country’). It’s strange because, in most parts of Nigeria, white people are smiled at or regarded with benign curiosity. In the Delta, they are positively glared at – the assumption being that you must work for one of the evil oil companies. So, the sight of a lone ‘oyibo’ in a suit, in a wooden boat with the chickens, must have been a novelty. The chap I was heading to meet, Dr Edmund Daukoru, is one of the fathers of the oil industry in Nigeria. Now retired, I suspect his coronation is a political reward for his years of ‘service’. Although he now claims to represent the interests of the people, this is the same man who was charged in 1993 with embezzling US$41m of public money. On Saturday, he was crowned Mingi XII of Nembe (translation: The twelfth king of the western Niger Delta region), with a solid gold crown and elephant-tusk sceptre, which were made for him by Aspreys of London. He is now treated with the utmost respect and deference. He is not allowed to eat in public (that would undermine his superhuman status), people are not supposed to meet his eye, and no-one can touch him (he has a kind of horse-tail fly-swat with which he touches people and gifts to acknowledge them). Happily, he is a geologist by training and a fan of National Geographic. Which meant that I was his guest of honour for the day. We spent about 3 hours at an elaborate church service, surrounded by large, colourfully-dressed Nigerian women, who would stop fanning themselves occasionally to bellow ‘Hallelujah’. The front rows were taken up by the twenty or so chiefs of the kingdom, all dressed like 70s pimps. Somewhere between Liberachi and Huggy Bear. Floor-length velvet sequined robes, gold jewellery, walking canes and top hats (or bowlers, straw boaters and pith helmets for the more adventurous). After the service, the pimp train paraded through the village back to the palace for a slap-up banquet. The Mingi (King of the Pimps), took his place on an elaborate throne, flanked by guards with golden spears. He invited me to sit next to him, much to the annoyance of the chiefs, who are busily jostling for favour with the new big man in town. Who was this random white guy taking the best seat? But, once the champagne came out, they loosened up and I spent the afternoon getting drunk with the chiefs. At the end of the day, the Mingi instructed one of them to escort me back to Port Harcourt. But for a brief and dramatic run-in with some soldiers on the road, we made it back in one piece. Another day in Nigeria