Shell divides $46.5 million between 15,500 Nigerians in oil spill compensation
Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) has allocated N600,000 (approx. US$3,000) to each of 15,500 indigenous peoples of Bodo, in the Gokana Local Government Area of Rivers State, as a monetary compensation for its excessive oil spills in the past years. These oil spills have had a damaging effect on the Ogoni environment. The compensation was decided after six years of legal battle.
Extracts from related article
In 2010, Shell agreed on out-of-court settlement in a case brought against it by the people of Bodo community over the excessive oil spills from the company’s failed facilities, which had caused a damaging effect on the Ogoni environment and its people.
Disclosing this much during a solidarity visit by a delegation of Friends of the Earth and Environmental Rights Action FoE/ERA led by its Executive Director, Dr Godwin Ojo, the Chairman of Bodo Council of Chiefs, Mene Sylvester Kogbara, said Bodo people had already started to use the money to “develop themselves.”
Kogbara explained that after six years of intensive legal battle with the oil giant, Shell agreed to cough out 56million euros as compensation to be shared among the indigenes of Bodo.
Meanwhile, the representative of Friends of the Earth, Netherlands, Geert Ritsema, blasts Shell for the continuous gas flare in Nigeria, which he said has contributed to the global climate change.
“Oil companies in the Niger Delta behave like criminals. They don’t even respect their guidelines, which is why they must be made to comply with the international best practice. Shell is known for its poor environmental behaviour,” he said.
The Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) is an international, nonviolent, and democratic membership organisation. Its members are indigenous peoples, minorities, and unrecognised or occupied territories who have joined together to protect and promote their human and cultural rights, to preserve their environments, and to find nonviolent solutions to conflicts which affect them.
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