Oil production in Nigeria has been a mixed bag of fortune and misfortune, of blessings and curse, depending on who is feeling what effect. For the country, it has been a huge fortune. It is the source of her wealth, accounting for about 90 per cent of her foreign exchange earning. It is the source from which governments at the federal, state and local levels fund all developmental programmes and projects. (TELL, February 18, 2008).

Oil is one sector in which the much desired transfer of technology had, to some extent, been achieved, especially in the areas of exploration and production. Nigeria’s membership of such important bodies as the World Petroleum Congress (WPC), Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), and African Petroleum Producers Association (APPA) has raised the country’s profile internationally. In other words, that Nigeria is a force to reckon with in the comity of nations is, arguably, attributable to her being an oil producing country, (Udeme Ekpo, 2004: 39).

For the oil-bearing communities in the Niger Delta, however, oil has been more of a curse than a blessing. In communities where oil exploration and production are carried out onshore, deforestation, erosion and destroyed farmlands are the main signposts for this gift of nature. Oil production activities in these communities have polluted creeks and destroyed aquatic life. And where there are spillages, losses would be unquantifiable in monetary terms. There is also the problem of acid rain, which destroys houses, which people living within the vicinity of oil exploration and production activities have to contend with everyday of their lives (Ray Ekpu, March 10, 2008; Dan Agbese, January 25, 1993).

Obviously, over 50 years of oil exploration and exploitation had occasioned environmental degradation and pollution, resulting in excruciating and brutalizing poverty, unemployment, disease, health hazards and even death among people living in this region (TELL, February 18, 2008). According to Azigbo (2008:18), the major culprits in these ugly situations are the oil multinationals and the insensitivity of successive governments at the centre

Consequently, there has been for some time, which intensified since the late 1990s, the emergence of resistant organizations from various ethnic nationalities in the Niger Delta to confront the oil multinationals and the Nigerian government. The restiveness which stated on a mild note has since degenerated into a state of militancy, hostage-taking, destruction of oil installations, disruption of socio-economic activities and unparalleled violence, so that by 1998, the Niger Delta region had become a lawless zone (NDDC at a Glance, February, 2004).

At the root of the crisis in the Niger Delta have been the attempts by the indigenes of the region to control the oil resources located within their land. The struggle for the control of oil wealth by the indigenous population has a long history dating back to 1966 when the late Isaac Adaka Boro, attempted secession of the Kaiama Declaration. It has been sustained since then with the agitation taking different forms and dimensions.

Thus, examining the dimensions of resource control in the Niger Delta is the central focus of this study. The paper argues that the politics of oil in the Niger Delta highlights more profound national challenges with which the Nigerian state will need to contend, most notably, issues of fiscal federalism, minority rights, resources allocation and poverty alleviation.