Oil spills have effectively destroyed my community. Local farmers and fishers were forced to abandon their traditional ways of life. Bodo Creek is, ecologically speaking, dead.



These articles appeared in the U.K. Guardian on August 3 and 4

SHELL ADMITS LIABILITY

by John Vidal

Shell faces a bill of hundreds of millions of dollars after accepting full liability for two massive oil spills that devastated a Nigerian community of 69,000 people and may take at least 20 years to clean up.

Experts who studied video footage of the spills at Bodo in Ogoniland say they could together be as large as the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska, when 10m gallons of oil destroyed the remote coastline.

Until now, Shell has claimed that less than 40,000 gallons were spilt inNigeria.

Papers seen by the Guardian show that following a class action suit in London over the past four months, the company has accepted responsibility for the 2008 double rupture of the Bodo-Bonny trans-Niger pipeline that pumps 120,000 barrels of oil a day though the community.

Ogoniland is a small region of the Niger delta which threw out Shell in 1994 for its pollution but then saw eight of its leaders, including the writerKen Saro-Wiwa, executed by the government.

The crude oil that gushed unchecked from the two Bodo spills, which occurred within months of each other, in 2008 has clearly devastated the 20 sq km network of creeks and inlets on which Bodo and as many as 30 other smaller settlements depend for food, water and fuel.

No attempt has been made to clean up the oil, which has collected on the creek sides, washes in and out on the tides and has seeped deep into the water table and farmland.

According to the communities in Bodo, in two years the company has only offered £3,500 together with 50 bags of rice, 50 bags of beans and a few cartons of sugar, tomatoes and groundnut oil. The offers were rejected as “insulting, provocative and beggarly” by the chiefs of Bodo, but later accepted on legal advice.

Shell’s acceptance of full liability for the spills follows a class action suit bought on behalf of communities by London law firm Leigh Day and Co, which represented the Ivory Coast community that suffered health damage following the dumping of toxic waste by a ship leased to multinational oil company Trafigura in 2006.

Many other impoverished communities in the delta are now expected to seek damages for oil pollution against Shell in the British courts. On average, there are three oil spills a day by Shell and other companies working in the delta. Shell consistently blames the spills on local youthswho, they argue, sabotage their network of pipelines.

“The news that Shell has accepted liability in Britain will be greeted with joy in the delta. The British courts may now be inundated with legitimate complaints,” said Patrick Naagbartonm, coordinator for the Centre of Environment and Human Rights in Port Harcourt.

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SHELL HAS A LONG WAY TO GO TO MAKE AMENDS TO MY COMMUNITY

by Patrick Naagbanton

Shell’s admission of liability for two massive oil spills in 2008-09 in my village of Bodo in the Niger Delta is a step forward in the long struggle for corporate accountability. An impoverished village that yesterday lay in ruins has today felt a welcome glimmer of hope and justice.

We are happy with the news that Shell could be forced to clean up the environmental devastation it has caused and to pay more than $400m in compensation. But our jubilation is overshadowed by more than five decades of environmental and social injustice yet to be addressed.

Bodo village is a fishing community in the minority Ogoni region of the Niger Delta. Shell was forced out of Ogoni in 1993, following mass protests led by writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, who was executed on 10 November 1995 alongside eight other campaigners. Shell’s vast network of oil wells, pipelines, flow-stations and gas flares remained in Ogoni and are an everyday reminder of what we have suffered.

Many of Shell’s rusty, leaky pipelines date back to the 1970s and have been poorly maintained ever since (see pages 31-36 and 43 of Friends of the Earth Netherlands report). It was equipment failure that caused Shell’s high-pressure Trans-Niger pipeline to rupture on 28 August 2008, gushing an estimated 2,000 barrels of oil per day into Bodo for weeks. The land and water was covered in thick layers of crude. Shell was also responsible for a second spill from the same pipeline on 2 February 2009.

Oil spills have effectively destroyed my community. Local farmers and fishers were forced to abandon their traditional ways of life. Bodo Creek is, ecologically speaking, dead. The fish that were not killed by the heavy pollution now reek of petroleum and cannot sustain a village population of 69,000 people. Shell has violated our basic human rights to food, water and livelihood. The compensation Shell offered us – £3,500 plus bags of rice and sugar – was insulting and wholly inadequate.

Oil spills are a daily occurrence in the Niger Delta. According to United Nations Development Programme, more than 6,800 spills were recorded between 1976 and 2001, but many more have gone unreported (see page 21 of UNDP report). Independent estimates put the total volume of oil spilled in the Delta over the last 50 years at 9m to 13m barrels, twice that of BP’s Deepwater Horizon disaster. This estimate does not include the wider forms of oil pollution for which there is no data.

I helped the Bodo community file a case against Shell in the high court in London because it is easy for Shell to abuse the judicial system in Nigeria. The oil giant spent decades fighting lengthy appeals that bled the victims dry in legal costs. Shell is appealing against a 2006 order to pay $1.5bn in damages to the Ijaw communities of Bayelsa State. Since 2005, Shell has refused to comply with a court order to end gas flaring in the Iwherekan community. The The Ejama Ebubu community has waited more than 40 years for Shell to clean an oil spill from 1970. Life expectancy in the Delta is around 43 years (see page 24 of UNDP report). Rural communities impacted by pollution in the Niger Delta are routinely denied access to justice.

Taking the Bodo case to London, the seat of Shell’s global headquarters and a European oil capital, was a last resort. On this occasion, it has proved harder for Shell to evade responsibility. Our hope is that this case will force Shell to compensate more victims in a timely and adequate manner and to clean up its widespread pollution in the Delta. We note with dismay that Shell is refusing to compensate victims in alegal case brought by Nigerian farmers and Friends of the Earth in The Hague.

Across the Delta, we still face a number of challenges. Shell and the Nigerian authorities must take immediately action to clean up and remediate more than 2,000 oil spill sites (see page 16 of Friends of the Earth Netherlands report). Every day that Shell delays clean up, the ecological damage worsens. Oil is spreading across the creeks and mangrove forests and seeping deeper into the water table. The cumulative impact on the environment will take decades to remedy. A new UNEP report is expected to confirm the depths of the environmental damage the Ogoni region.

Nigerian laws must also change. Currently, victims of oil spills have highly limited statutory rights to compensation. A single payment of $7,000 (see page 52 of Amnesty report) can discharge oil companies from having to clean up oil spills no matter how big. Such token fines must be replaced with meaningful penalties that are stringently enforced. Companies like Shell cannot be allowed to exploit lax regulations abroad, and no company should be above the law.

How long will Bodo village have to wait before it will be restored by Shell? Ejama-Ebubu is still waiting more than 40 years on. In cases like Oruma, Shell’s clean up efforts have done more harm than good. Shell has scooped and dumped the oil inside pits and set them ablaze, incinerating local farmland. The past 50 years shows us that Shell will only take action under intense public pressure from investors, governments, and the international community. We won’t be holding our breath