Jim Wiwa

Chief Jim Beeson Wiwa (1904 – 1 April 2005) was a chief of the Ogoni people of southern Nigeria, and the chairman of the Council of Chiefs of Bane. He was born in Bane, Rivers State. He was the father of executed playwright and environmentalist Ken Saro-Wiwa and of doctor and human-rights activist Owens Wiwa, and the grandfather of journalist Ken Wiwa. Life

Wiwa worked as a forest ranger and businessman in addition to his chieftaincy role. His son Ken Saro-Wiwa was educated at a government college in Umuahia and at Stella Maris College in Port Harcourt before becoming a prominent writer, television producer, and human rights activist as president of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP).

Following Ken Saro-Wiwa's execution by the military government of General Sani Abacha in November 1995, Jim Wiwa outlived his son by nearly a decade. In a 2001 interview, then aged 96, he reflected on the reversal of traditional expectations in Ogoni culture, where he should have been cared for by his son in old age: "No-one is feeding me. I leave the whole thing in the hands of God, but how can I be happy?"

Jim Wiwa died on 1 April 2005 at the age of 100 or 101, having lived through the colonial era, Nigerian independence, the Nigerian Civil War, and the execution of his son.