As a result of the company’s oil spill, Oruma, Goi, and Ikot Ada Udo have received $16m in compensation.
Following negotiations between the company and Friends of the Earth, a sum was agreed upon.
Eric Dooh, son of one of the farmers who launched the case in 2008 alongside the Dutch branch of Friends of the Earth, said that this compensation would allow us to rebuild our community once again.
In this case, locals accused Shell of causing irreparable damage to their communities in 2004, but a Dutch court dismissed the case last year after ruling that Shell’s Nigerian branch was responsible.
Regardless of the verdict, the multinational was held legally accountable for the damage instead of its subsidiary.
Affected communities in Nigeria have rarely won a case against a corporation as large as Shell. Since the 1980s, oil spills and damage caused by big oil companies are typically ignored.
As a result of these organizations’ refusal to take responsibility, the locals have been displaced, crime has increased, and poverty has increased.
This $16m compensation is a win for the locals, even if it is a meager amount in the grand scheme of things, since some of them cannot even fathom the possibility of going up against a corporation as large as Shell.
A court ruling last year ordered Shell to install an early leak detection system. This has now been installed, according to Shell and Friends of the Earth.
