The governor of Nigeria’s Bayelsa state has renewed calls for oil companies like Shell and Eni to pay $12 billion to clean up the pollution from their operations in the state over the past 50 years.
The call comes more than a year after a Bayelsa state-appointed commission released its report in May 2023 detailing the extensive damage oil companies have caused to the environment and local communities in the state in the Niger Delta. The commission recommended developing a comprehensive cleanup plan and estimated that remediation efforts could cost $12 billion and up to 12 years, proposing a fund financed by the oil companies. Additionally, the commission recommended changes to Nigeria’s regulatory schemes, strengthening scrutiny of oil company practices, and overhauling how they engage with host communities.
At a press conference in Abuja on Oct. 30, Bayelsa Governor Douye Diri urged governors from other Nigerian oil-producing states to join Bayelsa in the “battle for environmental justice.” He also demanded the national government “grants Bayelsa greater access to ecological funds.”
Kathryn Nwajiaku-Dahou, chair of the commission’s expert working group, told Mongabay that presenting the findings in the country’s capital was significant because “cleaning up Bayelsa and restoring the environment in a way that people can actually live and breathe and even hope to thrive is the responsibility of the Nigerian government.”
Nwajiaku-Dahou added the Nigerian government is responsible for holding the oil companies accountable, as are the home governments of the companies.
At another meeting days earlier, Diri committed to creating a body to oversee the implementation of the commission’s recommendations, although Mongabay’s emailed request for details on this remained unanswered by the time of publishing. Diri officially received the commission’s report at this meeting, according to a press release by the commission.
A commission spokesperson attributed the long delay in receiving and discussing the report to elections and scheduling issues.
However, any delay “is not a mere technicality,” said Joe Snape, senior associate solicitor at U.K.-based law firm Leigh Day, which represents communities affected by oil spills in the Niger Delta.
“Every delay has a very real impact on the communities who continue to live with devastating pollution which impacts all parts of their day to day life,” he told Mongabay, adding that some communities his firm represents have been fighting legal battles against Shell for almost a decade.
Oil majors like Shell and Eni have dismissed the commission’s findings, blaming saboteurs for the oil spills. They’re also actively divesting from their onshore operations in the Niger Delta and moving offshore.
Shell has also “repeatedly — and unsuccessfully — tried to use legal technicalities to evade accountability” in court, Snape said. Even where Shell has agreed to pay compensation, “the environment has still not been cleaned, which Shell are required to do,” Snape said, forcing the community to return to court next year.
Terkula Igidi contributed reporting from Abuja.
Banner image of oil spill in the Niger Delta by Milieudefensie via Flickr (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
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