With the publication of a good number of plays such as Battles of Pleasure (2009), Three Plays (2010), Uloho (2012), Crude Nightmen (2015) and now, Majestic Revolt (2016), Omoko has evidently pit his tent as a consistent voice from the Niger Delta area of Nigeria. The themes that dominate his dramatic manipulation which include cultural rejuvenation, ecological tempers and social justice, traverse the domains of Nigeria. By implication, since the release of his first play in 2009, Omoko has proven to be a committed voice fast emerging in Nigeria.

Published in 2015 by Kraft Books Limited, Peter Omoko’s Crude Nightmen which is set in the Delta creeks foregrounds the scuffle over the sharing of money ensuing from the oil windfall between two neighbouring communities, Otugbene and Abotigbene which once shared notable communal bonds. Because of the paltry sum of two million naira given to both communities by the oil capitalists in their land, they forego their once harmonious relationship and nurse hatred against each other which unfolds their foolhardiness. What triggers this frozen relationship is the bigoted sharing of the money led by Minikini and Opokumo of Otugbene who employ strategies of arithmetic stealing by giving only 25% to Abotigbene.

The Abotigbene people led by Bebekumo reject this sharing formula, stressing that the money must be shared into two equal halves. That is, 50% to each community. This sentiments and resentments degenerate into a temper of hatred between Abotigbene and Otugbene. Ridiculously, Minikini destroys Otugbene community and her warriors with the same bomb secured through the help of Mr Edgerton of the oil company to fuel the crisis in both communities while the business of drilling the oil yields bounteous profits to the oil capitalists. Through the featuring of a madman who regains his sense at the resolution of the play, Omoko clearly depicts a characteristic temper of oil-induced lunacy in Crude Nightmen.

Besides the insane greed displayed in the sharing of the oil money, the foolhardiness of Minikini to have yielded to Mr Edgerton’s antics underscores the greed-induced insanity which is birthed by the oil exploration and extraction. Omoko’s deployment of a madman who regains his sense immediately after the devastation of Otugbene by Minikini’s mishandled bomb, is worthy of critical examination in the overall insanity dramatized in the play. The pathological instance of psycho-healing becomes suggestive of the sanity and tranquility that engulf the society after the detonation of the bomb.

Thus, metaphorically, the bomb quells the restless spirit of madness which is manifested by Minikini in the play. Thus, Omoko’s casting of a mad character summarises the psychosis that constitutes the rhythm of the play, and he obviously images the inner restlessness, and the irrational dis-inhibited behaviours of the Minikinis and Opokumos of the Nigerian society.

Apparently, the insanity dramatized in this play is the illogicality that is demonstrated by Minikini and Opokumo as a result of their ravenousness urge to corner a large chunk of the money accruing from the oil windfall. The apprehensiveness of these characters and their display of irrational obsessional traits foreground their anxiety neurosis. The insanity of Minikini becomes evident when he declares brazenly that he really needs his family share of the oil money in order to marry a new wife: “I need my family’s share so that I can bring in my new ayoro” (9). Here, Minikini’s ridiculous display of his libidinal drive for sexual pleasure reveals his mental ill-health. This further underscores the craziness of many Nigerians who can barter their future and the future of generations with mere sexual inducement.

As the action progresses, the anxiety neurosis of Minikini becomes perceptible. We notice his inner restiveness in the quest to garner more money from the oil payout, even if it requires selling off the whole of Otugbene. Consequently, Mr Edgerton who understands the people’s naïveté decides to fuel the crisis by securing adequate and sophisticated weapons to Otugbene to fight the people of Abotigbene; while the oil business thrives without any interruptions.

Following the above, Minikini’s eventual signing of an MOU for Mr Edgerton and his cohort to drill Otugbene oil for thirty good years without disruption by the natives, patently highlights the imprudence of Minikini. Recognizing the depravity of the people’s mind, Mr Edgerton manipulates their psychic compositions in such a way that the audience is nauseated by Minikini’s level of lunacy.

The people’s inability to recognize the excesses of the oil expatriates as the major causes of their predicaments, and their reeling in joyful elation over meager money used to placate their minds, palpably exposes the inanity that characterized the dispositions of the greedy natives of the oil rich Delta. Though the oil multinationals acknowledge the problems of the Niger Delta natives, the people’s inability to project and assert their demands and their consequent display of triviality, distracts the oil capitalists from their quandaries. Happy at the people’s level of idiocy, Mr Edgerton unfolds his conspiracy against the people: “They should continue to fight over peanuts while we make profit from their backyards” (41).

He therefore, regards the natives as primitive people whose lands and waterways are occasionally devastated by the activities of oil exploration and extraction; but he swears never to waste money to clean such damaged lands. Thus, he manipulates Minikini’s mentation with insignificant amount of money to push the Otugbene to a full blown war with the Abotigbene. The reader is further angry at the illogicality of Opokumo who later yields to the plan to sign an MOU with Mr Edgerton which he had bluntly condemned.

All efforts by Benefa to encourage moderation in the excesses of Minikini prove abortive. Minikini has thus been blinded by self-indulgence and becomes obviously agitated and irritated. Benefa’s advice that they “could find a better way of ending this madness” (52) of oil triggered avarice is rebuffed by Minikini whose mind is bent on war as the only alternative of exterminating the Abotigbene people so that Otugbene people will have the oil to themselves. He tells Benefa: “That you are afraid of blood does not mean that you will not go to war with the Abotigbene when the need arises” (57).

From the above submission we can deduce the symptoms of anxiety neuroses and hypomania which are manifest in Minikini’s restlessness and display of over-active dis-inhibited and irrational conducts. The foolhardiness of Minikini affects his entire household. This further suggests that the individual who lives and interacts with a madman is not far from being mad. Thus, we can recall the ridiculous displays of Minikini’s wives when he lets out his political ambition to them. Though his decision to become a Local Government Chairman has not been put into fruition, the wives have begun fights for the position of the First Lady.

Omoko’s deployment of a Madman in the play is symptomatic of the illogicality and depravity that constitute the mental compositions of the Minikinis and Opokumos of this world. Benefa’s son, Pere sums it up when he says that “if this madness of greed and insensitivity is not stopped now, soon we shall all die” (28). This prophesy is later fulfilled when Otugbene is razed by Minikini bomb. Thus, the position of the mad character in the play is socially and metaphorically convincing.

In spite of a few cases of typographical errors, and the author’s failure to provide a glossary for the native Izon expressions that pervade the play, Omoko’s Crude Nightmen is a remarkable parody on individuals whose mindscapes have been devastated by the flourishing enterprise of the oil boom. This boom as we learn from the play’s action is paradoxical— it portends doom to the natives of the oil belt area of the Delta. Besides the interesting management of subject matter and techniques, Omoko demonstrates the freshness of his native intelligence in this play.

* Stephen Kekeghe is a researcher on literature and psychiatry at the University of Ibadan, and also teaches literature in the Department of English, College of Education, Warri, Delta State