Nigeria: UK Courtroom Options Against Shell Over Nigerian Oil Spill

The UK High Courtroom trial finds that Shell plc and its broken-down Nigerian subsidiary would perchance also be held legally liable for legacy oil pollution in Nigeria.

The High Courtroom has dominated that Shell plc and its broken-down Nigerian subsidiary would perchance also be held legally liable for legacy, or historic, oil pollution which has devastated the environments of two communities in Nigeria. The judgement blueprint that Shell, and its broken-down Nigerian subsidiary, would perchance also be held liable for oil spills and leaks going attend many years.

Years of power oil spills beget left the Bille and Ogale communities, which beget a blended inhabitants of fifty,000, with out natty water, unable to farm and fish and with extreme ongoing pains to public neatly being. Shell tried to forestall these claims from getting to trial with a unfold of technical, lawful arguments that beget now been firmly rejected by the Courtroom.

After a four-week High Courtroom preliminary factors trial from 13 February to Friday 7 March 2025, Mrs Justice May presumably perchance dominated on Friday 20 June 2025 that Shell’s attempts to ban the scope of the upcoming fat trial, to be held in 2027, had failed. She made several findings that are vital for environmental claims in total.

Claims for legacy pollution

· Shell had argued that there became once a strict five-year limitation duration and that the communities were barred from claiming when it comes to any oil spills that took attach bigger than five years ago, even when they’d no longer cleaned up the pollution. The procure rejected this and left it birth to the communities to bid for oil spills which occurred bigger than five years ago, including if Shell has failed to natty them up successfully.

· The procure stumbled on that a failure to natty up will be an ongoing breach of Shell’s lawful obligation to natty up and would perchance presumably perchance fetch a recent lawful to make a lawful bid for each day that the pollution remained. The procure also conception of as that an oil spill will be a trespass and, the attach that became once the case, “a new cause of action will arise each day that oil remains on a claimant’s land”.

· It is miles a in point of fact vital vogue in these claims and more broadly for legacy environmental pollution introduced about by multinational companies across the enviornment. The lawful attach following the UK Supreme Courtroom case of Jalla v Shell Global Trading and Shipping Vo Ltd [2024] AC 595 looked as if it would be that companies would perchance presumably perchance no longer be held liable for legacy pollution if the claimants failed to file their bid in the middle of the relevant limitation duration. Alternatively, the Ponder current this bid from Jalla and made it obvious that the claimants are no longer prevented from bringing claims if a polluter has left contamination on their land, even when a spill took attach many years ago.

Unlawful bunkering and refining

· Throughout the preliminary factors trial Shell sought responsible noteworthy of the pollution in the Niger Delta on illegal actions comparable to oil theft (is named ‘bunkering’) or native artisanal refining of oil. The communities’ legal professionals, Leigh Day, argued that Shell had over and over failed to rob total steps to cease the bunkering and resulting illegal refining and oil pollution, from taking attach.

· Shell argued that it would perchance presumably perchance never be liable for pollution developing from bunkering or illegal refining. The procure rejected Shell’s arguments and stumbled on that Shell will be liable for effort from bunkering or illegal refining if it failed to guard its infrastructure, and in particular if there is evidence that its procure workers were complicit in the illegal actions.

· The 2 communities notify that there is obvious evidence that Shell’s workers and contractors are themselves complicit in illegal bunkering which causes devastating pollution in the Niger Delta and it would be a central command in the trial which is attributable to rob attach in 2027. The communities are currently making ready to cite mountainous evidence to spice up their allegations of complicity.

Liability of Shell plc

· Shell argued on the preliminary factors trial that the Nigerian lawful framework prevented claims in opposition to its parent firm, Shell plc, for oil spills from pipelines. The procure rejected this argument and concluded that Shell plc can composed be liable for these spills.

· This blueprint that the claims in opposition to Shell plc will proceed to trial and there will be scrutiny of Shell plc’s involvement in its Nigerian operation over many years, which resulted in power pollution to the Bille and Ogale communities. The resolution, on the side of the Supreme Courtroom’s resolution in Okpabi v Shell plc, also opens the door for Nigerian communities to pursue claims in opposition to Shell plc in the Nigerian courts, would perchance presumably simply composed they decide to execute so.

Nigerian Constitution

· The communities also argued that Shell’s pollution breached their constitutional rights below the Nigerian structure and African Constitution on Human and Peoples’ Rights. The Ponder stumbled on that oil pollution can engage the lawful to lifestyles below the Nigerian Constitution, discovering that “knowledge about the impact of environmental harm has moved on such that there is now a greater readiness to see polluting activities as capable of engaging the right to life” (para 326).

· The Ponder neatly-known that the “direction of travel” of the Nigerian Supreme Courtroom became once to recognise the relevance of major human rights in cases of pollution. Alternatively, she did no longer allow the constitutional claims to proceed in opposition to Shell since as an English procure she felt that such a lawful vogue about the interpretation of the Nigerian Constitution needs to be left to the Nigerian courts.

· The onus is now in consequence of this truth on the Nigerian courts to elaborate this level about whether or no longer an oil firm comparable to Shell would perchance also be liable for breaches of major constitutional rights developing from extreme pollution.

Subsequent steps

The trial is a serious moment in the lawful bid by the Bille and Ogale communities, who were combating UK-based solely mostly Shell plc and oil firm Renaissance, formerly Shell Petroleum Pattern Firm of Nigeria Ltd, for a natty-up and compensation since 2015. Neither neighborhood has had a staunch natty up no topic the ongoing extreme pains to public neatly being documented by the United National Atmosphere Programme in 2011.

The Bille and Ogale communities were represented in the trial by Leigh Day global crew companions Daniel Chief and Matthew Renshaw who urged Fountain Courtroom’s Anneliese Day KC, Matrix’s Phillippa Kaufmann KC, Anirudh Mathur and Catherine Arnold, 2 Temple Gardens’ Alistair McKenzie and Blackstone Chambers George Molyneaux.

Reacting to the High Courtroom judgement, the chief of the Ogale neighborhood, King Bebe Okpabi acknowledged:

“It has been 10 years now since we started this case, we hope that now Shell will stop these shenanigans and sit down with us to sort this out. People in Ogale are dying; Shell need to bring a remedy. We thank the judicial system of the UK for this judgment.”

Leigh Day global department associate, Matthew Renshaw acknowledged:

“Shell’s attempts to knock out or prohibit these claims by a preliminary trial of Nigerian legislation factors were comprehensively rebuffed. This opens the door to Shell being held liable for their legacy pollution as neatly as their negligence in failing to rob cheap steps to forestall pollution from oil theft or native refining. This sets a in point of fact noteworthy contemporary lawful precedent in environmental claims in opposition to multinational companies.

The trial in opposition to Shell and its broken-down Nigerian subsidiary, including when it comes to the complicity of their workers in illegal actions that introduced about pollution, will now rob attach in early 2027. Our potentialities reiterate, as they beget got over and over for 10 years, that they simply need Shell to natty up their pollution and compensate them for their loss of livelihood. It is miles high time that Shell cease their lawful filibuster and execute the lawful element.”