NPDC Takes Over Shell’s Wells in Ogoniland?
Read the first reaction of the Ogoni people through the MOSOP President /Spokesman, Hon. Goodluck Diigbo
Join this unfolding development to share ideas with the Ogoni people, oil companies and the government. This is a significant unfolding situation in the global oil industry. Ogoni is Nigeria's most devastated oil drilling field. The European Parliament describes the situation in Ogoni as an environmental nightmare. Ogoni wants a meaningful resolution and this is the time to offer your ideas and suggestions.
When the Anglo-Royal Dutch/Shell started oil operations in Ogoni in southern Nigeria, it was known as Shell-BP. In June 2009, Shell settled a case of murder of Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight others out of a court in New York for $15.5 million. Shell wanted to use that settlement to return to Ogoniland where it had stopped operations over a decade.
It was not certain whether or not, Shell still had right to operate under international law or go to arbitration to sort things out with its partners. With recent troubles with BP, with which Shell shares common secretive policy and the habit to hide information; Shell has been pressured by its own conscience to finally get out of Ogoni.
Yet, Shell's pipes still run across Ogoni land carrying crude to oil Bonny Terminal near Ogoni for export. The Ogoni case vs. Shell and Nigeria is a case to watch as things begin to unfold.
As MOSOP Leader, I have issued my first reaction to the announcement today that Shell is handing over its operations to Nigerian Petroleum Development Company, NPDC - an arm of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC. The Ogoni demands were made also on NNPC, a senior partner of Shell operations in Nigeria. To hand over Shell's operations to NPDC does not make sense, because NNPC has not settled its own dispute with the Ogoni people.
Shell says it is handing over and at the same says it wants to remain a partner in Ogoni. The Ogoni had demanded for self-determination according indigenous peoples rights as well as corporate accountability for human and environmental rights violations. The settlement in New York was a tip of the iceberg.
The link below can take you to my preliminary reaction published in my column: StudytourUS1.Newsvine.com.