Shell ignored the warning warnings ‘scam’, the complainant says BBC

A BBC investigation has discovered accusations that the energy giant Shell has ignored the repeated warnings that a controversial cleaning operation of contaminated oil areas in southern Nigeria has been harassed by problems and corruption.

The multinational headquarters in London, together with the Nigerian government, has repeatedly declared that the work to clean sites contaminated with Ogoniland oil, which began about eight years ago, is going well.

But the BBC has discovered evidence that they were repeatedly warned for several years that the scheme, established by the Government and financed by several oil firms for a sum of $ 1 billion (£ 805 million), has suffered a series of problems.

A close observer has described the cleaning project as a “scam” and a “scam” that has wasted money and left the people of Ogonliland in the Niger Delta region that continues to live with the devastating impact of oil pollution, 13 years after a UN Innovative report lifted the lid on the seriousness of its situation.

Shell told the BBC: “The operational environment in the Niger Delta is still challenging due to the large scale of illegal activities such as oil theft.

“When spills occur from our facilities, we clean and remedy, regardless of the cause. If it is an operational spill, we also compensate for people and communities.”

The accusations are expected to arrive as a civil trial will begin on Thursday in the Superior Court of London, where lawyers representing two communities of Ogoniland of around 50,000 inhabitants will say that Shell must take responsibility for the oil pollution that occurred between 1989 and 2020, supposedly of its infrastructure.

Communities say that spills have left them without clean water, unable to grow and fish, and created serious risks to public health.

Shell, who has been pressing to sell his assets in the country of Western Africa to focus on drilling on the high seas and gas on land, has indicated that he will defend the statements.

It denies irregularities and says that spills in the region have been caused by sabotage, theft and illegal refining by which the company says it is not responsible.

The BBC has visited the affected areas in the Niger Delta, where Shell, the private oil and private gas company in the country, discovered the existence of crude oil 68 years ago.

The UN says that at least 13 million barrels have been spilled, or 1.5 million tons, crude oil since 1958 in at least 7,000 incidents in the Niger Delta region.

Spills have left many families concerned about their health and livelihoods.

Grace Audi, 37, lives with his partner and two -year – This case.

His family and neighbors only have access to a contaminated well, which forces them to buy clean water to use to drink, cook, wash and, once a day, redden, at a cost of 4,500 Nigeriana naira ($ 3, £ £ 2.40), in an area where the average daily salary is less than $ 8.

It is a family story for many in Ogoniland.

Paulina Agbekpekpe told the BBC that the lush vegetation once surrounded prosperous mangroves of her community in bodo, which she is not one of those who go to court on Thursday. She said that rivers and ponds used to cry with all kinds of animals and fish, particularly PeriWinkle.

“The place was greener, not only mangroves, but all on the coast: there were potato potatoes, palm trees and more. But during spills, destruction has contaminated everywhere,” said the six -year -old mother of six years .

His family had survived for fishing generations, until a devastating spill 10 years ago.

“Most children, of drinking water, have diseases. Many have died. I have lost eight children. My husband is sick.

“Because our livelihoods have been removed, people in bodo are hungry and suffer.”

In 2011, the UN Environment Program (UNEP) published an important study on the impact of pollution in the oil -rich area.

He found that the members of a community in Ogoniland were drinking contaminated water with a carcinogen known at levels more than 900 times above the Directive of the World Health Organization (WHO). The same chemist, benzene, was detected in all its air samples.

He also discovered that the sites that the Nigerian subsidiary of Shell, the Nigerian Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC), said having remedied, were still contaminated and the techniques they used did not reach the regulatory requirements.

The report concluded that an integral cleaning of the area He would take 25-30 years – and led to the formation of the Hydrocarbons Contamination Remediation Project (Hiprp).

This was initially established by the Nigerian government in 2012, but no cleaning was initiated, until it was relaunched by a new government in December 2016.

Hyprep was financed in part by oil companies, including the National Petroleum Company (NNPC) and Nigerian state -owned Shell (NNPC) and Shell, which gave $ 350 million.

However, the BBC has seen internal documents that suggest that the representatives of Shell and the Nigerian government were warned on numerous occasions of the alleged fraudulent practices of the agency.

A person aware of the project spoke with the BBC about his concerns, and asked to remain in anonymity for fear of reprisals.

“It is a common knowledge that we are really doing is a scam. The majority is to deceive the Ogoni people,” said the complainant.

“It is a perpetuated scam so that more money can be put in the pot and end in the pockets of politicians and other people in power.”

Accusations on Hyprep failures include:

• Contracts granted to companies that had no relevant experience
• Laboratory results that are falsified, sometimes marking the contaminated soil and water
• Project costs are inflated
• The external auditors, sometimes, were blocked to verify cleaning on the sites had been carried out correctly.

In the minutes of a meeting in 2023, representatives of Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary, UNEP and Hiprep attended, it was pointed out that “incompetent” contractors were “committed again” and that they should not “not degrade the environment even more “

In a separate filtered report seen by the BBC of the same year, it was pointed out that the laboratory results “regularly reported with deviations.”

In 2022, the UN wrote to the Nigeria Ministry of Environment, warning that if nothing changed, the “extremely poor standards” of cleaning would continue.

The BBC has asked Hyprep and the Nigerian government to comment on the accusations, but has not received an answer.

But our research has revealed evidence that Shell was aware of problems.

In a meeting with the British High Commissioner of Nigeria in January last year, of which minutes were obtained under the Law of Freedom of Information, Shell’s representatives recognized the “institutional challenges” of the cleaning agency and the possibility of the negative of “future financing” towards him.

Shell told the BBC: “Hyprep is an agency established and supervised by the federal government of Nigeria, with its Government Council largely composed of high ministers and government officials, together with five representatives of communities and NGOs and a single representative of Shell “.

This is not the only remediation project in Ogonilandia that was supposedly failed.

In 2015, Shell agreed to an agreement of £ 55 million for cleaning after two catastrophic spills in 2008 of its infrastructure in the Bodo area.

The company said that the cleaning, carried out by the Bodo Mediation Initiative (BMI), which is intended to serve as a mediator among the oil companies, including Shell, and the Bodo community (and is financed by the oil giant and the Nigerian regulators) has been certified as 98% complete.

However, the BBC visited sites inside the area and found that crude oil pushed the ground and floated in the waters.

Shell and BMI insist on any occurrence of oil spills in the region are due to theft, known in the industry as “oil bunkering.”

“There is a plan to call contractors again to clean those areas to the specifications, to the standard,” said Boniface Dumpe, director of the BMI, to the BBC.

“It is the responsibility of all interested parties, Shell, yes, take care of their facilities, make sure that the reimbursement does not come from its facilities.

“But for the areas that have been cleaned. I think some responsibility is also that the community ensures that some illegal activities do not cause react.”

Shell said active measures are needed to avoid oil spills caused by oil bunk.

The company said: “We take extensive measures to prevent this activity and the spills that it causes, including air surveillance, the elimination of illegal connections in the pipes and through the construction of steel cages to protect the well heads.”

The alleged failures in oil cleaning occur when Shell prepares to sell to its Nigerian subsidiary, the SPDC, to Renaissance Africa, a consortium of local and international businesses.

Some locals in Ogoniland have accused the oil giant of “fleeing” to properly clean the earth and the waters alleged that was contaminated.

They also fear that Shell can still benefit from the area simply exchanging oil extracted from the region in the future.

“The operations of any oil operator take care of the relevant pipes will have a huge impact on their daily lives,” said Joe Snape, lawyer of Leigh Day, to the BBC.

“There are incredibly few details about what these offers will lead.

“It is not clear how the Renaissance (Africa) will act in the future. At least with Shell we have means for you to accounts.”

Mineral products, such as oil and oil gas, represent 90% of Nigeria exports, most of which come from the Niger Delta region.

The locals, whose main source of livelihood has been agriculture and fishing, told the BBC that from the discovery of oil, or what some refer as “black gold”, their home had been pumped for profit, by the main oil companies, for oil thieves. and for corrupt politicians.

They say they have not seen any benefits, only suffering, such as OGBOE patience, which blames recent oil spills for their failed crops.

“Previously, if I harvest, I can eat some with my family and even sell some … but in recent years I could not get anything. It is really bad,” the 42 -year -old BBC.