By Amnesty International: 26 May 2023

Nigeria’s new government, which will be sworn in on 29 May, must ensure that Shell’s planned sale of its operations in the Niger Delta does not lead to a further deterioration in human rights in a region blighted by decades of oil pollution.

Amnesty International has documented grievous and enduring human rights abuses resulting from oil contamination in the area, where Shell has operated since the 1950s. Amnesty International is concerned that the proposed sale will deny people already harmed access to adequate remedy, and potentially expose many more to future abuses.

A new report issued today, Tainted Sale?, recommends a series of safeguards and actions to help protect the rights of people potentially affected by Shell’s planned disposal of its onshore oil interests in the Niger Delta, reportedly for about US$3 billion. read more

The Washington Post

Big Oil is selling off its polluting assets — with unintended consequences

Shell’s divestments in Nigeria help the company meet its green goals. But villagers and watchdogs say conditions have worsened after the sales.

By Rachel Chason: March 27, 2023 at 2:00 a.m. EDT

NEMBE, Nigeria — When Lambert Ogbari learned that the oil giant Shell was selling its local operations to a Nigerian firm, he said he felt hopeful his living conditions would finally improve. But he quickly noticed that maintenance on the oil wells surrounding his village had declined.

Then, one night, Ogbari woke up to a loud bang, followed by the smell of gas. Crude oil was shooting out of a well near his home with such force that people hundreds of yards away could hear the roar.

As the world wrestles with climate change, major oil companies are selling off polluting assets around the globe. Shell, which announced in 2021 that it is looking to exit Nigeria’s onshore market completely, has repeatedly said in annual reports over the past eight years that divestments in Nigeria and elsewhere have played an important role in decreasing the company’s greenhouse gas emissions. Shell’s withdrawal is part of an exodus by some of the world’s top energy companies from the Niger Delta, which had long made Nigeria the largest oil producer in Africa. read more

The struggle continues: Please show compassion for the widows of the Ogoni 9

JANUARY 16, 2023 BY ANDY ROWELL BLOG POST

Extracts

When the Nigerian writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa was murdered in 1995 along with eight other colleagues, his reported final words were: “Lord take my soul, but the struggle continues”.

Saro-Wiwa and the others had been campaigning against Shell’s ecological destruction of Ogoniland. Thirty years ago this month, on January 4 1995, some 300,000 Ogoni, some sixty per cent of the population, peacefully protested against the oil giant’s activities. At the time, it was the largest mobilisation against an oil company worldwide. read more

Large-scale polluter Shell loses legal battle

The Guardian: Isabella Kaminski: Thu 29 Dec 2022 12.00 GMT

Between 2004 and 2007, the villages of Oruma, Goi and Ikot Ada Udo in Nigeria were polluted with oil from infrastructure built by Royal Dutch Shell. More than 15 years later, in late December, the company finally agreed to pay four farmers and their communities €15m in compensation and install a leak detection system after a court in the Netherlands ruled that Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary was liable and the parent company had a duty of care. read more

REUTERS

Nigerian widows end their case in the Netherlands against Shell

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – A group of four widows who had sought to hold Shell liable for damages in the Netherlands after their anti-oil activist husbands were executed by the Nigerian government in 1995 have cancelled further legal proceedings, their lawyer said on Monday.

“Obviously this is not without disappointment and frustration,” said lawyer Channa Samkalden in statement announcing that the widows have cancelled an appeal launched after the Hague District Court rejected their case earlier this year. read more

The Washington Post

Widows of executed Nigerian activists end case against Shell

By Mike Corder | AP: November 8, 2022 at 5:49 a.m. EST

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — The widows of four Nigerian activists executed in 1995 have withdrawn their appeal in a Dutch civil case in which they alleged that oil giant Shell was complicit in the men’s deaths, ending a yearslong legal battle for compensation and an apology.

The four widows, Esther Kiobel, Victoria Bera, Blessing Eawo and Charity Levula, launched the case in 2017. It was rejected in a final ruling by The Hague District Court in March, following an interim decision in 2019 dismissing parts of their claim.

Their husbands were among nine activists from the Ogoni tribe, led by writer Ken Saro-Wiwa, who were hanged in 1995 for the murder of four political rivals. Supporters say they were really targeted because of their involvement in protests against environmental damage by Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary. read more

Bloomberg

Shell-Backed Cleanup in Niger Delta Is Worse Than Estimated: NGO

William Clowes, Bloomberg News

(Bloomberg) — Restoration work at a Shell Plc-financed cleanup of oil pollution in southern Nigeria may be of poorer quality than previously thought, an organization that monitors the effort said after it re-tested samples in an overseas laboratory.

The $1 billion restoration of Ogoniland – a small kingdom in the Niger Delta — began in 2019, on the advice of a 2011 UNEP report. The project was backed by promised funding from Shell and support from the UN agency. read more

Extracted from pages 18 & 19 of Shell Sustainability Report 2020

SHELL PLC BUSINESS ETHICS AND TRANSPARENCY

ETHICAL LEADERSHIP

Our core values of honesty, integrity and respect for people underpin our work with employees, customers, investors, contractors, suppliers, non-governmental organisations and others. The Shell General Business Principles, introduced more than 40 years ago, describe our core values, our responsibilities and the principles and behaviours that guide how we do business. read more

CNN

Shell escaped liability for oil spills in Nigeria for years. Then four farmers took them to court — and won

By Nimi Princewill and Krystina Shveda, CNN: Updated 1540 GMT (2340 HKT) May 25, 2022

Nigeria (CNN)When Nigerian environmental lawyer Chima Williams launched a lawsuit against oil giant Shell plc, he did not envisage a 13-year battle that would lead to a landmark ruling and land him a prestigious environmental award.

Williams, who is the executive director of the Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria, successfully convinced the Court of Appeal in the Hague that Shell plc was responsible for the activities of its subsidiary in Nigeria — Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC) — and for oil spills that ravaged local farmlands.

The suit against Shell Nigeria was brought by four farmers from the Goi and Oruma communities in the country’s oil-rich but impoverished Niger Delta region, who said their farms were left in ruins after major spills from underground pipelines.

The decision to allow Shell plc, formerly known as Royal Dutch Shell plc, to be sued in this jurisdiction set a precedent as it was the first time the Dutch parent company was sued in its home country for the actions of its foreign subsidiary, SPDC.

Shell Nigeria (SPDC) was eventually held liable for the oil spills and ordered to pay damages to the farmers in a January 29, 2021, ruling by the Court of Appeal of the Hague. SPDC was also ordered to carry out an intensive clean-up of the damage to the communities.

Williams was on Wednesday awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize for his work in holding the company accountable for the environmental damage. read more

Nigeria: Dutch court rejects suit of ‘Ogoni Nine’ widows against Shell

The court said there was insufficient evidence to support claims of the families of the activists executed alongside the writer Ken Saro-Wiwa in 1995.

23 March 2022

A Dutch court has thrown out a suit against Shell brought by four widows of activists who were executed by late Nigerian military leader Sani Abacha in 1995 after protests against the company’s exploitation of the oil-rich Niger Delta.

The court said there was not enough evidence to support the widows’ claim that Shell had been involved in bribing witnesses related to the case.

In 2019, the court had handed the widows a rare win in their long-running battle by allowing the case to continue. But it had also said the claimants needed to prove Shell’s liability.

Shell has always denied wrongdoing.

Esther Kiobel, whose husband Barinem Kiobel was among those executed, said she would file an appeal at The Hague.

“We can’t do it in Nigeria because they [the government] are the collaborators,” she said. “I want their [activists] names exonerated. That’s what I want and that’s what I’m fighting for.” read more

The Hague: Esther Kiobel vows to continue her campaign for justice

23 March 2022

Human rights defender Esther Kiobel today lost her civil case against oil giant Shell, which she accuses of complicity in the 1995 execution of her husband by the Nigerian military government, but has promised to continue her campaign for justice. Esther has spent 27 years seeking justice for her husband Dr Barinem Kiobel, who was hanged along with eight other men in connection with widespread protests against oil pollution in the Niger Delta.At a witness hearing in 2019, three men told the Dutch court that Shell and the Nigerian government had given them money and offered them other bribes in order to incriminate Esther’s husband and eight other men, known collectively as the “Ogoni Nine”. But today, the court ruled that there was insufficient evidence to prove that Shell had been involved.

Esther Kiobel brought the case against Shell along with three other women, Victoria Bera, Blessing Eawo and Charity Levula, whose husbands were also executed in 1995. Amnesty International’s research into the historic injustice has revealed how Shell’s requests for ‘assistance’ in handling environmental protests led to a brutal government crackdown, culminating in the arrests and unlawful executions of the women’s husbands, as well as renowned activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and four other men.

“This is a disappointing outcome, but these extraordinarily brave women are not giving up. Their voices have been heard. They should be commended for their resilience and unbreaking commitment to exposing the truth, and for the invaluable work they have done to highlight the global culture of impunity for multinationals accused of human rights abuses,” said Mark Dummett, Head of Business and Human Rights at Amnesty International.

“It has taken years of legal wrangling for Esther Kiobel to get Shell to face her in a courtroom. Shell tried every trick in the book, from disputing jurisdiction to refusing to hand over crucial documents. The fact that it took more than twenty years for a court to hear Esther’s argument is a grim indictment of how corporations are able to evade accountability for terrible crimes and human rights abuses. Despite the ruling today, Esther’s battle for justice has not been in vain – her persistence represents a powerful argument for change. Governments must do more to hold companies accountable for human rights abuses, and make it possible for the victims to seek justice.”

Esther Kiobel fled Nigeria and settled in the US following her husband’s killing. She first filed a case against Shell in New York in 2002, but in 2013 the US Supreme Court ruled that the US did not have jurisdiction to hear the case. In 2017, Amnesty International supported Esther Kiobel, Victoria Bera, Blessing Eawo and Charity Levula in bringing a new case against Shell in the Netherlands. The four plaintiffs accused Shell of being instrumental in the unlawful arrest and detention of their husbands; the violation of their husbands’ physical integrity; and the violation of their right to a fair trial and to life, and their own right to a family life. The case was held up when Shell refused to hand over crucial documents relating to the case, and it was not until 2019 that the District Court of The Hague heard the women’s arguments for the first time.

Amnesty International has extensively detailed Shell’s role in the crackdown in Ogoniland. In a 2017 report read more

The Hague: Esther Kiobel vows to continue her campaign for justice

March 23, 2022: Vivian Omotori

Human rights defender Esther Kiobel today lost her civil case against oil giant Shell, which she accuses of complicity in the 1995 execution of her husband by the Nigerian military government, but has promised to continue her campaign for justice. Esther has spent 27 years seeking justice for her husband Dr Barinem Kiobel, who was hanged along with eight other men in connection with widespread protests against oil pollution in the Niger Delta. read more

Reuters

Exclusive-Shell’s Nigerian oil assets attract interest from local firms, sources say

LONDON (Reuters) – At least five Nigerian oil and gas companies are preparing to submit bids this month for Royal Dutch Shell’s onshore oilfields in a sale that could fetch up to $3 billion, three sources involved in the process told Reuters.

Shell started talks with the Nigerian government last year about selling its stake in the West African country’s onshore fields, where it has been active since the 1930s, as part of a global drive to reduce its carbon emissions. read more

SHELL ASSETS DIVESTMENT IN THE NIGER DELTA: THE WHOLE TRUTH FROM AN INSIDER’S VIEW

By Zik Gbemre

• I am vindicated by the unbiased account expressed by a former Shell General Manager on why the oil major left Delta state.
• Until we situate the blame in all honesty and amend our ways, we will remain stagnated as a state and in the south of the Niger Delta at large.

When stakeholders often rationalise where to situate the blame over the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) unforgettable divestment of its key assets in Delta state which drastically shattered the state’s economy, I tell people not to look too far to find the key actors who forced that situation.

People may blame Shell, but Shell wasn’t the problem. Even if Shell genuinely intended to leave Delta, it never meant to leave the way it did. The greedy, thieving PDP hegemony of government over the state gave much recognition to violent youths above the law-abiding from the greed of James Ibori to the insensitivity of his successor cousin forced the Shell exit. read more

Bloomberg

Nigerians in Oil-Rich Delta Pin Hope on U.K. Trial Against Shell

In the heart of Nigeria’s oil region, communities and their leaders see a U.K. court as their best chance to resolve a legacy of environmental damage in the area that they blame on Royal Dutch Shell Plc.

More than 40,000 residents of the crude-rich Niger Delta were permitted by the U.K. Supreme Court in February to seek compensation over pollution, allegedly caused by Shell, in a reversal of two previous rulings. The communities see this process as a guarantor of their legal rights, even if Shell were to follow through on its plans to exit some of the oilfields. A date for a trial hasn’t been set. read more

Image Credit: KICKBACK NEWS

By John Donovan

KickBack.news, the anti-corruption website recently founded by Javier Ferrandis has published a remarkable article under the headline:

DONOVAN vs. SHELL: A 30 Years Epic battle against a corporate giant.

Extract

Disgruntled employees, interested in learning about or airing the dirty laundry of the Shell Group, or journalists, who want to find out what’s up at one of the largest corporations in the world, know that you have to start your search by simply typing royaldutchshellplc.com on your browser. read more