Text from: Friends Of The Earth / Lessons Not Learned – The Other Shell Report 2004
http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/reports/lessons_not_learned.pdf
In Nigeria, Shell operates under the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC), a joint venture of Shell and the Nigerian government. The government is now nominally a democracy, but has a long and brutal history of military dictatorships. Ogoniland and the half a million Ogoni people in the southern part of the Niger Delta region have often taken center stage in the international media on Nigeria. The Delta was once considered “the breadbasket” of Nigeria because of its rich ecosystem, where people cultivated fertile farmlands and benefited from abundant fisheries. Shell and other oil companies have transformed this once pristine area into a virtual wasteland bearing deep scars from gas flaring and oil spills. In 1995, the execution of poet and human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other activists unleashed international outrage over the situation in the Niger Delta. Ken Saro-Wiwa was a leader of an organization of Ogoni people called the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) which demanded that Shell take responsibility for its massive environmental devastation of their homeland and denounced the injustices that Shell has inflicted on the Niger Delta: Injustice as a Shell Trademark Nigeria Ogoni and other peoples in the Niger Delta. In 1995, Ken Saro-Wiwa and 13 other MOSOP leaders were subjected to a secret tribunal that, based on unsubstantiated allegations, sentenced nine of the men to death by hanging. All nine were summarily executed without any opportunity for appeal. At the time of the execution, Shell wielded significant influence over the Nigerian military dictatorship through the profitable SPDC joint venture between Shell and the Nigerian government. However, Shell denied that it had any role in the execution of the MOSOP leaders. Shell even went so far as to claim that it had no moral obligation to intervene in the military tribunal on behalf of the MOSOP leaders, although it had done so on at least one occasion on behalf of a Shell employee who faced murder charges in Nigeria.
In 1996, Shell launched a public relations campaign to repair its negative image among customers and investors in western countries. It re-introduced itself as a company with human rights, social responsibility, and sustainable development at the core of its values and practices. However, ten years on, Shell continues to demonstrate that it has failed to learn important lessons. Shell’s environmental legacy in the Delta is strongly evident today. Although the company temporarily suspended operations in Ogoniland in 1993, an infrastructure of aging pipelines that should have been replaced at least 25 years ago crisscrosses the Delta. Leaks and oil spills are commonplace. One account determined that for the relatively short period between 1976 and 1980, there were 784 oil spills from Shell’s malfunctioning operations. Over the past year, several of Shell’s oil spills and leaks have polluted Ogoniland and caused fires including on the surface of water that burned fishing canoes. Shell claims that these oil spills are the consequence of sabotage; however, the Ogoni people believe that the real culprit is Shell’s failure to properly maintain and upgrade its oil pipelines and other infrastructure. During a visit in April 2005 to the Niger Delta, Friends of the Earth encountered a Shell contractor involved in a “clean-up” operation near Rukpopkwu, a community affected by a December 2004 spill. The clean up involved little more than the turning of the land, placing the oil just below the surface.
Shell is at the center of another human rights controversy in Ogoniland today. MOSOP believes that the police are instigating violence in Ogoniland, including kidnapping and assaulting community members with machetes. MOSOP views the use of troops to brutalize Ogoni people as part of an orchestrated campaign of intimidation to facilitate the re-institution of Shell’s operations in Ogoniland, which were temporarily suspended in 1993. The Ogoni people are outraged by these efforts to cut off public debate about the massive and still unresolved problems caused by Shell’s operations. Tensions are building as the Ogoni people have threatened mass action against SPDC if police are not withdrawn from the area. Under pressure from Nigerian peoples and the international community, Shell has committed to eliminating gas flaring in the Niger Delta by 2008. However, Shell is now publicly stating that it may miss the deadline for ending gas flaring, and has actually increased gas flaring since 2003. Although the Nigerian government is poised to impose penalties on Shell if it fails to meet the deadline, Shell has demonstrated its disregard for such governmental orders. Most recently, Shell has ignored a governmental order requiring the company immediately to pay $1 billion USD, and the balance of $500 mil- lion USD, over five years in restitution for its extensive environmental damage in Nigeria.
