SUMMARY
The Bush Boys (also known as Peace Makers or Piribiapu) was a community defense group composed of members from the Okrika community, a sub-group of the larger Ijaw ethnic group in Nigeria’s Rivers state. The Bush Boys was one of many small armed groups, commonly referred to as a cult groups, active in the Niger Delta and had its base in the town of Okrika.
The Niger Delta is where most of the crude oil that constitutes a substantial amount of the Nigerian revenues is located. Local communities have however generally been excluded from the benefits of the resource. The concentration of oil in this area has led to several violent episodes and clashes between ethnic groups contesting the ownership of land and waterways in and around the oil rich delta. In the late 1990s and early 2000s there was an upsurge in communal violence in all of Nigeria, especially in the southern parts. The increased violence was connected to the establishment of a civilian government in 1999, which brought an end to a 15 year long military dictatorship. The new political landscape complicated the situation in the Niger Delta further as this led to changes in fragile power relations between ethnic groups in the area and new possibilities of gaining political power emerged, as did several new actors. In this setting of uncertainty and chaos, the Okrika community clashed with the neighboring Eleme community over the ownership of the Onne port in Port Harcourt, where several important oil refineries were located. The protracted conflict between the Okrikaand the Elemeled local Okrikachiefs to task each war-canoe house (a trading and fighting unit made up by kinsmen living in the same area) in the area to nominate two men for the defense of the community and it was in this context that the Bush Boys emerged.
During the Eleme-Okrika conflict, Okrika fighters stationed in the forest borderland between the two communities were referred to as “piribiapu”, meaning “boys in the bush”, and the group consequently became known as the Bush Boys. After the ethnic conflict fizzled out, sources report that the group also became known as “Peace Makers”, as the members started perceiving themselves as peace makers in the community, rather than ethnic combatants.
The group was led by Sunny Opuambe until 2009, when he was assassinated near Port Harcourt. Another notable member of the Bush Boys was Ateke Tom, a notorious militant whose ties to the group soon deteriorated. After his fallout with the Bush Boys, Ateke Tom began setting up other armed groups in the region and he later became the leader of NDV.
In 2010 it was reported that the Bush Boys had laid down arms and apologized to the population and the authorities, although it remains unclear whether or not the group still exists.
Deebam (alternatively Deegbam, Deybam, Deygbam, Dey Gbam, pidgin for “Be strong”) was an armed group that emerged in Nigeria’s River state in 1991. Often described as a cult, or street gang, Deebam 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. Deebam was one such offshoot. The group was formed by the Klansmen Konfraternity (KK), which originated from the University of Calabar in Cross River state, and was intended to be used to fight for supremacy and territory through organized violence, banditry and criminality.
While formed by KK, Deebam evolved to become largely autonomous from its parent confraternity. The group’s first leader was Onengiye Ofori Terika (also known as Occasion Boy), who in Deebam terminology was known as “Teetan the Great,” or “Teetan the Giant,” simply meaning the group’s chief. Terika hailed from Buguma village in Degema Local Government Area (LGA) of Rivers state, and the early history of the group was tightly tied to the local community’s struggle for compensation from Shell and other oil companies in the area. In October 2003, Terika was killed in a shoot-out with the Deewell and NDV cult groups. He was replaced by Kingsley Akogu, popularly called “King”, with roots in Omoku community in the Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni LGA of the same state. Akogu’s reign was short-lived, as he was shot by dead by security operatives shortly after taking over leadership of the group. Ichechi Owaka, popularly called “Angel,” subsequently took over and headed Deebam until June 2004, when he was killed when the military invaded a joint Deebam–NDPVF (see below) training camp in Ogbakiri. He was succeeded by Prince Glad, who later adopted the name Prince Igodo. Like his predecessors, he too met a violent ending; Igodo was killed in June 2007, by a joint force of fighters from fellow-cult groups Outlaws and Niger Delta Strike Force (NDSF), a break-away faction from NDPVF. Following Igodo’s death, Deebam saw a period without a clear leader. At the time, sourced from within the group stated that a new leader would be appointed in early 2008, but it is difficult to determine whether this happened or not. Little is known on the group’s leadership during the ten years following Igodo’s death. However, by 2017, a “Mr. Supreme” was known to head Deebam. He was subsequently killed in a shootout with Nigerian troops, and it is unclear who succeed him. Throughout all these leadership changes, Deebam retained a strong leadership structure. This was sustained by extremely tough initiation ceremonies and high membership dues and contributions.
Deebam 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 Deebam was able to recruit its members. Thus, the primary common denominator for the Deebam members seems to not have been ethnic (even though it appears as if most are Ijaw), but a poor background and very bleak prospects for the future. Due to the secretive nature of the group, its size is difficult to determine. While a 2007 estimate by an analyst said 700 active members, Deebam itself claimed to have some 3000 members in Tombia, Degema LGA; 2500 in Bukuma, Degema LGA; and 6000 in Port Harcourt at the same point in time. There are no verified current figures for the group’s strength.
As noted above, Deebam first emerged in southern Nigeria’s Rivers state, and while the group had several affiliated cult cells scattered across the larger Delta region, this is where its main area of operation remained. It initially had its headquarters in Tombia, in Degema LGA, but under Owaka’s leadership it was moved to Ogbakiri in Emauoha LGA. Both locations are near Rivers state’s main town, Port Harcourt.
In the highly volatile Niger delta, two main groupings, or alliance blocs, emerged in the mid-2000s, centered on the two militant groups NDV and NDPVF (for information on the conflict between the two, see NDV-NDPVF. Deebam joined the NDPVF team, and by doing so increased its access to sophisticated weapons and speedboats. It also, by default, became allied to the other cult groups supporting NDPVF, such as Greenlanders and Bush Boys. These groups at times fought together. In late 2005, Deebam broke away from this tactical alliance after a disagreement over money with NDPVF. Illustrating the fluid nature of alliances in the region, Deebam in late June 2007 bound together with its previous adversary NDV, to fight against the Outlaws, whose leader Soboma George had emerged to be Rivers state’s single most powerful and politically connected cult leader. It is unclear what the current state of alliances looks like among the cult groups of Rivers state.
NDV (Niger Delta Vigilantes; also commonly referred to as Icelanders, Germans, and Ateke Boys) was a mainly Ijaw militant group active in Rivers and Bayelsa States of Nigeria. The leader of the group, Ateke Tom, had previously been a member of the Bush Boys, one of the smaller armed groups commonly referred to as cult groups, which was based in the town Okrika, in the oil-rich Niger Delta. After a fallout with the Bush Boys, Ateke Tom began setting up his own armed group. This was done in a chaotic context. At the time there was intense intra-Okrika (an Ijaw sub-clan) competition, resulting from the death of the last Amayanabo of Okrika, king sir, S. P. U. Organ. The royal family was split on who should succeed him, and this split came to permeate all spheres of Okrika society. The two factions each had a military wing, and Ateke Tom came to lead one of them. This inra-Okrika conflict was, in turn, closely tied to the political sphere, as the two factions were allied with the main political parties, ANPP (All Nigeria People’s Party) and PDP (People’s Democratic Party). PDP politicians such as Peter Odili and Abiye Precious Sekibo played an important role in arming and helping create Ateke Tom’s group.
The formation of NDV was also closely tied to the phenomenon of university confraternities. 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 competed for spheres of influence by violent means; a transformation that many argue reflected a wider breakdown of traditional values in society. In 1984 the SVC (Supreme Viking Confraternity) was formed in Harcourt and in the 1990s the group set up two allied street gangs. This was part of a broad trend of campus-based confraternities extending its influence by creating street and creek wings (‘cults’). Ateke Tom was a member of SVC, and NDV – at the time called Icelanders – was one of the cults established.
During most the 2000s it seems clear that NDV continued to be supported local PDP politicians. According to human rights organizations, the former Secretary to the State Government, Abiye Sekibo, provided logistical support and political protection to Ateke Tom from 2001 on. Atekes profitable drug and bunkering activities were covertly condoned in exchange for his groups help in driving away and intimidating opposition supporters during the 2003 elections. While Tom denied to have received any support from the government, there are many indications that it continued during NDVs non-state conflict against the rival Ijaw group NDPVF (Niger Delta Peoples Volunteer Force) in 2004. As a member of NDPVF claimed, forces of MOPOL, the Nigerian Mobile Police, sided with NDV in the non-state conflict and shot at NDPVF troops. A junior NDV fighter confirmed that NDV "worked with MOPOL" in an effort to push back the NDPVF from the village Tombia in February 2004.
Ateke Tom also admitted that a local chief from his hometown Okrika village had supplied the NDV with weapons. Furthermore, according to the state government, many of the over 100 smaller armed cult groups in the Niger Delta were for some years either allied with NDV or its rival NDPVF. Alliances in the delta were notoriously unstable, however, and it was not uncommon that groups switched sides.
NDV was loosely organised and mainly composed of young Ijaw men from Port Harcourt and nearby villages and reportedly had its logistical base in Okrika. Among the members of the group were many unemployed university graduates who were frustrated with poverty, underdevelopment and the lack of job opportunities.
In 2009 Ateke Tom willingly surrendered to President YarAdua at the Government House in Abuja. This happened three days before the closing of the government amnesty program ended. After Tom’s amnesty, NDV weakened and began to disintegrate. However, factions of it remained, continuing to deal in drugs and fight for control of different parts of primarily Port Harcourt.
NDV has been involved in the non-state category of UCDP organised violence.
