For the people living in the region, the discovery of oil has ruined livelihoods and devastated the land and the health of residents, resulting in high rates of poverty and unrest. Worse, despite revenues, the Delta’s peoples have yet to benefit from the oil extracted from beneath their feet.
Theft from the billion-dollar oil clean-up in Ogoniland is so bad that the operation s chief architect, the UN Environment Programme, wants to quit, The UN Environment Programme is set for a bitter break with Nigeria over the clean-up of pipeline spills in the Niger delta despite almost 15 years of close cooperation, Africa Confidential understands. The UN s withdrawal would have grave repercussions because the billion-dollar clean-up plan, financed by western oil companies and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), was meant to establish a template for environmental remediation in countries across the world where oil production has destroyed farmland and fisheries.
A Victory for Farmers in a David-and-Goliath Environmental Case
An appeals court said a small group of farmers in the Niger Delta region whose livelihoods were affected by oil spills in 2006 and 2007 should receive payouts.
The Bonny oil terminal, operated by Shell, in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. The ruling found that a subsidiary of the company had acted unlawfully by allowing the leaks to occur.Credit.Ron Bousso/Reuters
Jan. 29, 2021
A Dutch court ruled on Friday that a subsidiary of the British-Dutch multinational Royal Dutch Shell was liable for oil spills in the Niger Delta in Nigeria in 2006 and 2007, ordering the company to compensate a small group of residents in the region and to start purifying contaminated waters within weeks.