A major oil exporter to the US

Nigeria, meanwhile, is the fifth-biggest supplier of US oil imports - and Africa's largest oil exporter. In 10 years, by some estimates, the US will get a fourth of its oil from Africa. Nigeria is not, however, in the same league as Iran or Saudi Arabia, which exports about 10 million barrels per day. "Unlike [an attack on] Saudi Arabia," adds Mr. Goldwyn, "the world could manage around a major attack on Nigerian oil suppliers." Still, what happens here reverberates to gas stations across the world.

On Monday, one of the four hostages read a list of the captors' demands, including local control of oil wealth, a $1.5 billion payment by Shell to compensate for pollution, and the release from jail of an oil-region militia leader. Negotiators said Tuesday they had made contact with the captors and expected a peaceful end.

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Yet in Iwhrekan, tensions continue.

The dispute grew out of a disagreement over which contractor should clean up the oil spill. In the wake of the accident, the village council appointed a contractor to do the job. Shell appointed another, and when he arrived, villagers chased him away. The reason: The village-appointed firm had agreed to do such things as fixing the village's defunct water wells and providing plastic chairs for residents sit on.

Then, villagers say, the Shell-appointed man came late one night with a bevy of drunken soldiers - and Shell's approval - and ransacked the village, leaving one teenager hospitalized and four houses and two cars destroyed.

Shell, in a statement, denies inviting "any security agents into the community" and says the villagers have impeded cleanup.

Now it's a stalemate.

Residents are getting more and more angry - despite having the choice to allow the cleanup.

"Is this road fitting for an oil-producing community?" asks indignant village chairman Mr. Oweh, pointing to the bumpy dirt track that is his village's main street.

Yet Shell and other oil companies pay the government royalties and taxes that amounted to a whopping $27 billion in 2004. This is one of the world's most corrupt countries, however, and much of the oil money disappears into personal accounts of officials.

Nor is there much international pressure for peace and reconciliation in the area. Although, amid growing concern about terrorism, that could change.

There are fears that rising fundamentalism in Nigeria's Muslim north could combine with discontent in the southern oil region to bring international terrorist targeting of oil facilities. Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden even mentioned Nigeria as a potential target in a 2003 video. So far, though, there's no evidence of a north-south connection, Mr. Goldwyn says.

Still, in a sign of the country's growing importance, the US military has beefed up its presence here. And first fady Laura Bush was in Nigeria Wednesday, announcing $163 million in US aid for fighting AIDS. Whether it will all have any impact on Iwhrekan villagers is unclear.

Asked how long they're willing to live with the oil mess - to try to force Shell to capitulate - an articulate thirtysomething named Paris Eyarienoro declares, "Forever" if that's what it takes.

• Wire reports were used in this story.

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THE DOWNSIDE OF AFRICAN OIL: Oil is an important source of wealth in several African nations, but it often stirs up unrest among political and ethnic rivals. SOURCES: ORGANIZATION OF PETROLEUM EXPORTING COUNTRIES, ENERGY INFORMATION ADMINISTRATION OF U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY; AP