Royal Dutch Shell has expressed concern over its Nigerian onshore oil operations following continued theft and sabotage.
Ben van Beurden, the Chief Executive Officer of Royal Dutch Shell while reacting to the development noted that the company needs to take a hard look at activities on its onshore operations to limit the rising cases of theft and sabotage which affect the environment.
Reacting to court orders over activities related to oil spillage, the shell boss said, “our onshore oil position, despite all the efforts we put in against theft and sabotage, is under challenge.
“But developments, like we are still seeing at the moment, mean that we have to take another hard look at our position in onshore oil in Nigeria,” he added.
Over the past decade, Shell’s Nigerian onshore joint venture SPDC has sold about 50% of its oil assets. It could be recalled that a Dutch court had last month ordered Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) to pay compensation over oil spills in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria.
The Court of Appeal in The Hague had ruled that the Nigerian arm of the British-Dutch oil company, which has its headquarters in the Netherlands, must pay compensation over a long-running civil case involving four Nigerian farmers seeking compensation, and a cleanup, from the company over pollution caused by leaking oil pipelines.
Also, recall that in December 2020 officials of Royal Dutch Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary had been accused of allegedly masterminding the damage to oil pipelines so as to benefit from the money spent on repairs and clean-up operations.
