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media advisory
friends of the earth international
april 11, 2006
nigeria: court orders shell to stop gas
flaring by april 2007
LAGOS, NIGERIA, April 11, 2006 – The
Nigerian High Court decided today that oil
giant Shell must stop flaring gas in the
Iwherekan community in Delta State by April
2007, in a welcome victory for the mostly
poor people affected by the damaging and
wasteful practice of flaring in the oil-rich
Niger delta.
Shell's managing director in Nigeria and
the Nigerian Minister for Petroleum have to
appear in person before the judge in open
court on May 31 in Benin City with detailed
plans for putting gas flares out by April
2007.
In an earlier judgement of the High Court
on 14th November 2005 the judge ordered the
Shell Petroleum Development Company of
Nigeria Limited (Shell Nigeria) and the
Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation
(NNPC) to stop gas flaring in the Niger
Delta, as gas flaring violates guaranteed
constitutional rights to life and dignity.
Flaring in the community has continued
despite the November judgment in favour of
local resident Mr Jonah Gbemre and the
Iwherekan community.
Nigeria has been the world's biggest gas
flarer, and the practice has contributed more
greenhouse gas emissions than all other
sources in sub-Saharan Africa combined, as
well as poisoning localities with their toxic
cocktail.
The practice costs Nigeria about US$2.5
billion annually, while about 66% of its
population live on less than US$1 a day.
Shell Nigeria has said that it does not plan
to stop flaring before the end of 2009.
Reverend Nnimmo Bassey, Executive Director
of Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the
Earth Nigeria, said: “We expect this judgment
to be respected and that for once the oil
corporations will accept the truth and bring
their damaging and wasteful flaring
activities to a halt.”
“Oil giant Shell was told twice now to
stop gas flaring. Nevertheless, Shell plans
to continue flaring until 2009. It is time
that Shell starts to respect Nigerian law and
stops breaching human rights in the Iwherekan
community and in the rest of Nigeria,“ added
Paul de Clerck of Friends of the Earth
International.
In a February 2006 unrelated development,
the Federal High Court of Nigeria in Port
Harcourt ordered Shell and its partners to
pay Southern Niger Delta Ijaw communities
$1.5 billion in compensation for
environmental pollution and degradation in
the Delta. The sum was ordered by the
Nigerian parliament in August 2004.
IMAGES of gas flaring are available from
http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/images/shell_nigeria_2006
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
In Nigeria:
Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the
Earth Nigeria:
Chima Williams, lawyer +234 80 388 59477
+234 80 236 49890
Nnimmo Bassey, Executive Director +234
52602680 (office) +234 8037274395
(mobile)
In the UK:
Climate Justice Programme, Peter Roderick,
co-Director + 44 20 7388 3141
In Belgium
Paul de Clerck, Friends of the Earth
International
Tel: +32-473 510147 or email:
paul@milieudefensie.nl
NOTES TO EDITORS
[1] A copy of the November 2005 court
order is
available here
:
[2] More information on the gas flaring in
Nigeria is available in a report published in
June 2005 by the Climate Justice Programme
and Environmental Rights Action, ‘Gas Flaring
in Nigeria: A human rights, environmental and
economic monstrosity', which is
available here
, (HTML and PDF)
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