SUMMARY
Deewell (Deywell, Dey Well, pidgin for “Be well; alternatively Junior Vikings Confraternity, JVC) was an armed group that emerged in Nigeria’s River state in the late 1990s. Often described as a cult, or street gang, Deewell had its roots in the phenomenon of confraternities at Nigerian universities. The first confraternity, the Pyrates, was formed in 1952 and soon others appeared. Initially respectable social groups with objectives such as promoting social awareness and fighting social injustices, the confraternities eventually turned into belligerent gangs that fiercely struggled for supremacy; a transformation that many argue reflected a wider breakdown of traditional values in society. In the 1990s many of the confraternities began setting up business offshoots or ‘street cults’, especially in and around the major cities. Deewell was one such offshoot. The group was formed by the Supreme Vikings Confraternity (SVC), also known as De Norsemen Club of Nigeria, which itself was founded in 1984 at the University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State. Lacking a political agenda, the group’s main objective was to fight for supremacy and territory through organized violence, banditry and criminality. Furthermore, Deewell members were often hired as political thugs by Niger Delta political figures.
Compared to other cult groups, Deewell was less organized, lacking a central leadership. However, so-called ‘Skull executioners’ (bosses) headed its various cells and coordinated the group’s activities. Deewell emerged in Rivers state, which, together with Bayelsa and Delta states is the location of Nigeria’s large oil findings. However, the population, while suffering from the environmental degradation that has come in its wake, has received very little of the benefits from the oil. Instead, the area suffers from high unemployment rates and rife poverty and this created a pool of young men – often school dropouts, and criminal elements of rural communities and urban slums – willing to join cults and gangs. It was among these that Deewell was able to recruit its members. Thus, the primary common denominator for Deewell members were a poor background and very bleak prospects for the future. Due to the secretive nature of the group, its size is difficult to determine. Estimates vary widely, with some setting the size at 400 active members, whereas Deewell itself claimed a membership of 4000 in 2005.
As noted earlier, Deewell was set up in Rivers state, and emerged as an armed group initially in a slum area on the southeastern edges of Port Harcourt called Diobu. This was indicative for the group’s future operations, which tented to be confined to slum communities, both in Rivers and Bayelsa states. Furthermore, there was also a small Deewell presence in Delta and Imo states. More specific areas of control an operation are difficult to pinpoint due to the continuously shifting situation in inter-cult relations and power rivalries. In general, the areas in which Deewell conducts operations or engage in clashes tend to be different from the areas they consider to be their territory.
Deewell’s mother organization, SVC, originally set up Deewell as a response to the Klansmen Konfraternity’s establishment of the Deebam cult group. However, Deewell was initially too week militarily and failed to deliver in its conflict with Deebam. Subsequently, SVC set up the Icelanders, who later changed its name to NDV, to support Deewell. After this, the two groups were closely allied. Furthermore, in the highly volatile Niger delta, two main groupings, or alliance blocs, emerged in the mid-2000s, one of which centered on NDV and the other on the militant group NDPVF (for information on the conflict between the two, see NDV-NDPVF). By default, Deewell was on the NDV team and the two groups often fought together. However, illustrating the fluid nature of alliances in the region, Deewell in 2007 teamed up with the Outlaws, a splinter from NDV. Outlaws had emerged as Rivers state’s most powerful cult, and in the new cult landscape, Deewell found itself at odds with its former prime ally, NDV. Aside from cooperating militarily, the Outlaws supported Deewell with weapons, funds and men to acquire or regain new territories. It is unclear what the current state of alliances looks like among the cult groups of Rivers state.
