ANALYSIS

for Nigeria’s sweet “Bonny” crude and propelling the country on the path to becoming Africa’s largest producer.

Ledorsi’s story, and that of his village, are typical of the impact of the oil industry in the Delta. At least 5,280 oil wells have been sunk there, linked to more than 7,000 kilometres of pipelines. The infrastructure, which is prone to leaks – and the associated 24-hour gas flaring – disrupts the lives of more than 1,500 agricultural communities, according to data from Shell and the Petroleum Ministry.

The ecological impact is recorded in the quality of the air and water, and the soil people rely on to grow their food. There are well-above-normal levels of lead, cadmium, chromium, and nickel in several Delta rivers, according to a study by the environmental chemistry department of Nnamdi Azikiwe University, based in the south eastern city of Awka.

A 2011 report by the United Nations Environment Programme found that levels of the carcinogen benzene exceeded the level recommended by the World Health

Organisation. The region’s life expectancy, at 41, is a decade lower than the national average.

The UNEP study concluded it would cost $2 billion just to clean up Ogbono –one district that represents a small fraction of the entire Delta.

Delta communities, working with the support of environmental advocacy groups, have been fighting back. The Aghoro community in Bayelsa state, which is seeking $1.5 billion from Shell in compensation for a 2018 spill, got a court injunction in June last year restraining any asset sale pending the suit’s determination.

The Nigerian Supreme Court, where Shell is appealing against a $1.7 billion award to the Ejama-Ebubu community, has also asked that Shell stop any disinvestment sales for now.

For decades, a major impediment communities faced was the partnership between the government and the oil majors.

Government officials and agencies typically view any attempt by the communities to assert their rights as opposition and disruption of economic activity. If such opposition manifested itself as protests and demonstrations, the response has often been a heavy-handed crackdown by the security forces.

Affected communities and environmentalist groups have sought to overcome this by taking legal action against the energy companies in their home countries. ERA in 2008 filed a suit against Shell in The Netherlands on behalf of four farmers, including one from Goi, and three from other spill sites. The Court of Appeal in The Hague upheld Shell's liability in January 2021, ordering a compensation payment of $16 million to the four farmers.

A month later, the UK Supreme Court made a ruling allowing farming and fishing communities in the oil region to seek legal redress in the UK against Shell for environmental damage caused by its Nigerian subsidiary. The UK legal firm Leigh Day is currently representing more than 13,000 people and organisations in the Niger Delta who have filed loss of livelihood claims against Shell at the High

Court in London.

Some Nigerian courts have also given stern rulings against the oil companies. One example is the award against Shell to the Ejama-Ebubu community, which is for a spill that dates back more than 50 years.

As the leading international energy companies depart the onshore and shallowwater fields, smaller Nigerian independents are moving to take their place, snapping up the assets on sale amid concerns they lack the technical capacity to deal with the environmental fallout. An oil blowout from a field in the Nembe district of Bayelsa in 2021 owned by Nigerian firm Aiteo spewed hydrocarbons into the environment for more than four weeks before it was finally brought under control. The delay in staunching the flow was because the company had to fly in experts from outside Nigeria.

These spills in the smaller fields that Nigerian companies are buying might not generate the same international headlines that blighted the record of the oil majors. But they are happening in a politically significant region and will still have repercussions for Nigeria’s new president, who is due to be sworn in on May 29.

UK Supreme Court rules in favour of Shell over 2011 Nigerian coast oil spill

SHELL has won a legal battle in the UK Supreme Court against Nigerian claimants seeking damages over a 2011 offshore oil spill. The case involved two Shell subsidiaries and centred around an estimated 40,000 barrels of crude oil that leaked into the sea from Shell’s Bonga oil field, located 120 km off the Nigerian coast. The spill allegedly had a devastating long-term impact on the coastal area, affecting farming, fishing, drinking water, mangrove forests and religious shrines.

The ruling by the UK Supreme Court on May 10 upheld previous decisions by lower courts that found the Nigerian claimants had missed the six-year legal deadline for taking action. The Supreme Court rejected the claimants’ argument that the ongoing consequences of the pollution constituted a ‘continuing nuisance’.

“The risk of increased oil spills and other forms of environmental degradation remains elevated,” Ikemesit Effiong, head of research at Lagos-based business advisory group SBM Intelligence, told The New Humanitarian. “Much of the blowback will remain domestic and will remain a political headache for the incoming Tinubu administration.” waters, the militant groups that still take up arms from time to time, and the criminal gangs refining stolen crude in makeshift bush refineries that cause further untold harm to the environment. One tell-tale sign is the soot that settles quickly on any surface in the city of Port Harcourt, the by-product of the many illegal refineries at work in the surrounding countryside.

Much of the recent ecological damage has also been due to the region’s restiveness. Armed groups demanding greater control of the area’s oil wealth began attacking oil facilities, as well as the security forces, in the 1990s. The unrest only eased with a 2009 amnesty deal and the creation of a Delta development fund.

But there is still a pool of hands willing to join the pirates roaming the region’s

“There was no continuing nuisance in this case,” said Justice Andrew Burrows, speaking on behalf of the panel of five Supreme Court Justices. Shell has consistently denied the allegations made by the claimants, saying that the oil spill was dispersed offshore and did not impact the shoreline.

The ruling has broader implications for other cases brought by Nigerian residents of the oil-producing Niger Delta region, who have been trying to sue Shell in London courts. The case involving the Bonga oil spill was brought by a group of 27,800 individuals and 457 communities. The ruling will also apply to thousands of others who were involved in the case in the lower courts.

This is not the first time Shell has been the subject of legal action relating to pollution in the Niger Delta. In February 2021, a group of 42,500

“It’s really a vicious circle for the Niger Delta and its people,” Fyneface Dunmamene, who heads the Port Harcourtbased Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre, which seeks to protect the region’s ecology, told The New Humanitarian. “Most of the youths who can no longer fish or farm profitably have taken to one oil-related crime or the other that end up further compounding the problem.” farmers and fishermen from the Ogale and Bille communities were allowed by the UK Supreme Court to sue Shell over spills. That case is currently going through the High Court.

Shell also agreed in 2015 to pay out £55 million ($70 million) in compensation to the Bodo community in the Niger Delta following a protracted legal battle in London.

Reacting to the ruling, a spokesperson for Shell said: “We have always maintained that the 2011 Bonga oil spill was an operational mishap that was contained offshore and did not impact the shoreline.”

The spokesperson added that the company “will continue to focus on addressing the legitimate concerns of the communities in which we operate through responsible environmental stewardship, targeted social investment, and the development of local economies”.