Part 30

The Sage of the Ossiomo Rivers     Chapter 2

The Sage was out early, on the day the negotiating team was to meet the government officials about the new right of way on the farmlands of the said village. The government officials consisted of a team of six officials from the state government appointed by the Federal ministry of Petroleum Resources. Fortunately Iyagbaye had also arrived early bringing along files of signed petitions and pictures of farmlands destroyed by pipelines construction and oil spillages across fields. Even though it was a ready leverage for negotiation the Sage believed it would be a distraction rather than an advantage to show the government officials the signed petition and the pictures. As it turned out the petition was signed by a few of the royal emissaries of the villages, with most of the signatories  being thumb prints. The Sage expected that the government officials were well aware of the state of the pipelines constructed along the farmlands, so instead he relied on appeal.