By ADA DIKE
 |
| Douglas |
If tears
could bring back someone to life, the Special Adviser to President Goodluck
Ebele Jonathan on Research, Documentation and Strategy, Late Oronto Natei
Douglas (OND), would have come back to life. Tears that have been flowing since
the day he died showed that he was a good man and passionate to all he set out
to do.
Douglas is
one of the great supporters of Arts in Nigeria. He was an author, supporter of
Nollywood, patron of the African International Film Festival (AFRIFF) and
facilitator of the Africa Movie Academy Awards (AMAA) sponsorship by the
government of Bayelsa State, which he supported for over 10 years. He is known
to be a great friend of Nollywood because he played an important role in
facilitating the relationship between President Jonathan and the entertainment
industry which made it possible for Nollywood to receive the sum of N3 billion
from the President.
He loved
book and anchored the Presidential Bring Back The Book (BBB) initiative which
aimed at improving the reading culture in the country.
Oronto
helped to secure presidential support for various literary programmes including
Port Harcourt World Book Capital 2014.
His speeches
and articles have been published in books, journals and magazines in Nigeria,
Europe and the United States of America. His recent book: “Where Vultures
Feast, Shell, Human Rights and Oil in the Niger Delta” was published by Random
House.
He was a
former Commissioner for Information, Culture and Strategy for Bayelsa State.
Born on August 6, 1966 into the family of a fisherman father and a
traditional midwife mother in Okoroba, Bayelsa State, he got degrees in Law
from the University of Science and Technology, Port Harcourt, Nigeria, and De
Montford, Leicester, England. Douglas was called to bar by the Supreme Court of
Nigeria as an advocate in 1992.
The environmental
activist was a Deputy Director of the Environmental Rights Action/Friends of
the earth Nigeria, a group committed to ensuring that the environment is
protected. He was a member of the legal team that represented Ken Saro-Wiwa and
eight Ogoni activists during their trial under Gen. Sani Abacha’s government in
1994 to 1995.
The scholar
Douglas died at the age of 49 in Abuja on Thursday, April 9, 2015 after
suffering from cancer. He will be interred on Saturday, May 2, 2015 at St
Mark’s Anglican Church Premises, Okoroba, Nembe LGA of Bayelsa State at 2:30pm.
Thanksgiving/Outing Service will hold on May 3, 2015 at St Mark’s Anglican
Church, Okoroba, Nembe LGA, Bayelsa State. He is survived
by his wife, Tarinabo Douglas, and Children -Ogiel and Daniel.
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