ABSTRACT
The investigated the role played by information in conflict management of the oil producing communities of Gbaranmatu, Kegbara-Dere and Peremabri communities of the Niger Delta from 1992 to 2013.
The study highlights information as a factor used to douse or aggravate conflicts in the oil producing communities during conflict management from 1992-2013.
In carrying out this research, five research questions and purposes of study guided the study: they concern the conflicts in the oil producing communities from 1992-2013; role information played in these conflicts;
information sources used in conflict management in the oil-producing communities during the period; factors militating against effective information in conflict management in the past conflicts and strategies that could be used to improve information in conflict management in the Niger Delta.
The study adopted the historical research design. The area of study is Gbaranmatu, Kegbara-Dere and Peremabri communities of the Niger Delta.
The population for the study is 44,488, which has 14,833 for Gbaranmatu, 19960 for Kegbara-Dere and 9,655 for Peramabiri community. The population elements include chiefs, community chairmen, women leaders, religious leaders and youth leaders of the three communities.
INTRODUCTION
Historically, it is evident that information has been the resource of conflict , especially in developing and diverse countries like Nigeria where oil has generated more conflicts than gains.
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.
On 23 February 1966, Isaac Jasper Adaka Boro of the Niger Delta Volunteer Service (NDVS), made up of 159 youths, took up arms against the Nigerian state as a result of the injustice, marginalization,
and political exclusion suffered by the Ijaws and other Niger Delta indigenes in the immediate post-colonial Nigeria (Boro, 1967). This marked the beginning of conflicts in the Niger Delta.
It has been sustained since then with the taking different forms and dimensions (Boro, 1967). The crises of Ogoni (1994/95) Ijaw/Ilaje (1998-2000), Odi (1998/99), Warri (Urhobo/Itsekiri, 1952, 1981,1987, 1997-2002),
Ogbe-ijaw/Itsekiri (between 1995 and 2004) are just a few of the violent crises which led to the death of many people, staffers of oil companies,
members of the Nigerian police force, the destruction of properties, and the loss of production time and , both to oil companies and to the Nigerian economy at large Okoh (2002).
Oil was first discovered in commercial quantities in 1956 at Oloibiri in the present Bayelsa State of the Niger Delta of Nigeria.
The Niger Delta of Nigeria is home to Nigeria’s petroleum industry with Abia, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Cross River, Delta, Edo, Imo, Ondo and Rivers as oil-producing states; however, Bayelsa, Delta and Rivers states account for the bulk of Nigeria’s oil production.
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