Ten years ago, the cargo ship the Probo Koala reached the end of a four-month journey that resulted in toxic waste being dumped illegally in Côte d'Ivoire.

The sheer scale of the impact of the dumping created headlines around the world. More than 100,000 people needed medical assistance.

Multinational oil trading company Trafigura produced the toxic waste on board the ship as a result of refining a dirty petroleum product called coker naphtha to mix with gasoline and sell it on as petrol. Trafigura knew the waste was hazardous, but hadn’t figured out how to dispose of it safely.

Trafigura tried and failed to get rid of the waste in five countries: Malta, Italy, Gibraltar, The Netherlands and Nigeria. Its attempt to dispose of the waste in Amsterdam sparked an environmental incident when residents complained of the overwhelming smell and experienced nausea, dizziness and headaches after some of the waste was unloaded. Trafigura rejected an offer from a disposal company to deal with the waste safely in The Netherlands for the equivalent of US$620,000.

Instead, the toxic waste was finally dumped illegally in Côte d’Ivoire by a local company that Trafigura hired to dispose of it for just US$17,000 – a fraction of the price quoted in the Netherlands. To this day it is still not known where all the waste was dumped.

This is the story of a company putting profit over people and a community still waiting for justice and remedy.