Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Shell has admitted liability but has a long way to go to make amends | Patrick Naagbanton

9:29 AM | Posted by Free Game Zone | | Edit Post

Oil spills

destroyed my village in Nigeria and decades of environmental and social injustice have not yet been addressed

Income

Shell

responsibility for two massive oil spills in 2008-09, in my town of Bodo in the Niger Delta is a step in the long struggle for corporate accountability. A poor village was in ruins yesterday today felt a touch of welcome. Hope and Justice

We are pleased with the news that Shell could be forced to clean the environmental disaster that has caused and to pay more than $ 400 million in compensation. However, our joy is overshadowed by more than five decades of environmental and social injustice has not been addressed.

Bodo village is a fishing community in the region minority Ogoni in the Niger Delta. Shell was driven out of the Ogoni people in 1993 after mass protests led by writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, who was executed November 10, 1995, as eight other activists. Extensive network of oil wells Shell pipelines, pumping stations and gas flaring in Ogoni have remained and are a daily reminder of what we have suffered.

Shell oxide

many leaking pipes back to the 1970s and have been poorly maintained since then (see pages 31-36 and 43 Friends of the Earth Netherlands). Equipment failure is that the high pressure caused Shell Trans-Niger pipeline to rupture, August 28, 2008, which runs about 2,000 barrels of oil per day in Bodo for the week. The land and the water was covered with thick layers of oil. Shell was also responsible for a second shot in the same line, the February 2, 2009.

oil spills have effectively destroyed my community. Farmers and local fishermen were forced to abandon their traditional way of life. Bodo Creek is ecologically dead. The fish were not killed by the smell of oil today severe pollution and can not sustain a population of the village of 69,000 people. Shell has violated our basic human rights to food, water and livelihoods. Shell offers compensation - £ 3,500 sacks of rice and sugar -. Insulting and totally inadequate

oil spills are a daily reality in the Niger Delta. According to the United Nations for development, more than 6,800 spills were recorded between 1976 and 2001, but many more have been reported (see page 21 of the UNDP report). Independent estimates put the total volume of oil spilled in the delta over the past 50 years at 9 million barrels of 13 million euros, double the Deepwater Horizon BP disaster. This estimate does not include most forms of oil pollution for which no data.
  • Bodo community has helped me make a complaint against Shell in the High Court in London that Shell is easy to abuse the judicial system in Nigeria. The oil giant has spent decades fighting calls time consuming and bleeding victims dry in legal fees. Shell appealed against an order of 2006 to pay $ 1.5 billion in damages to Ijaw communities in Bayelsa State. Since 2005, Shell has refused to comply with a court order to stop gas flaring in the Iwherekan community. The Ebubu Ejama The community has waited 40 years for Shell to clean up an oil spill in 1970. Life expectancy in the delta is about 43 years (see page 24 of the UNDP report). Rural communities affected by pollution in the Niger Delta are denied access to justice.
  • Bodo Taking the case of London, which houses the world headquarters of Shell and oil capital of Europe, was a last resort. On this occasion, was more difficult for Shell to evade responsibility. Our hope is that this case will force Shell to compensate victims more quickly and appropriately, and clean their widespread contamination in the Delta. We note with regret that Shell refused to compensate the victims in a lawsuit by farmers in Nigeria and the Friends of the Earth in The Hague.
throughout the Delta, we still face several challenges. Shell and the Nigerian authorities must take immediate steps to clean and repair over 2,000 oil spill sites (see page 16 of the report of the Friends of the Earth Netherlands). Every day cleaning Shell delays, aggravating environmental damage. Oil spreads through the creeks and mangrove forests and filtered over into the groundwater. The cumulative impact on the environment will take decades to remedy. A new UNEP report should confirm the depths of the environmental degradation in the Ogoni region.

Nigerian laws must also change. Currently, victims of oil spills have few legal rights to compensation. A payment of $ 7,000 (see page 52 of the Amnesty report) to develop the oil companies to clean up oil spills, regardless of size. These symbols should be replaced by fines significant penalties that are strictly enforced. Companies like Shell can not be licensed to operate a lax regulation abroad, and no company should be above the law.

How long

Bodo to wait before being restored by the Shell? Ejama-Ebubu still waiting more than 40 years. Oruma In such cases, cleaning Shell have done more harm than good. Shell picked up and thrown into the oil wells and burned, the burning of local farmland. The past 50 years shows that Shell will act only under intense public pressure from investors, governments and the international community. We will not be idle.


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