Rivers State government acquires SPDC’s 45% stake in OML 11 oilfields

Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike yesterday disclosed that the state government has acquired 45 per cent stake of Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC’s) Oil Mining Lease (OML) 11 oilfields.

He said he has directed the Rivers State Ministry of Finance Incorporated to bid for the facility with $150m supported by a bank guarantee and cash payment of N1b to the Deputy Sheriff, the later payable to the judgement creditors and the former escrowed.

The oilfields are situated in Ejama Ebubu Community in Eleme Council Area, Ogoni and other communities of the state.

Ejama Community had taken Shell to court over failure to clean up its polluted environment since 1970 as SPDC admitted through vide letters seeking to clean the spillages in 2006, while the case was in court.

In a statewide broadcast yesterday, Wike said the acquisition of OML 11, emanated from a court judgment, which has been registered in the United Kingdom and Nigeria for enforcement.

“The fresh case commenced in 2001 and passed through four different justices of the court due to manipulations associated with opposing litigations, until it was dismissed in June 2010 by Justice Buba J.

“SPDC and its parent companies challenged the judgment on appeal in 2010, which again suffered setbacks as it passed through six panels comprising three justices between 2010 and 2017 before it was dismissed by the panel of the court led by Gumel J.C.A. of the Port Harcourt Division.

“SPDC and its parent companies further appealed the case at the Supreme Court in 2017, which was considered and dismissed by in a judgment by Justice B. Akaahs, JSC delivering a lead judgment in a unanimous decision.

“After losing at the High Court, SPDC gave the Ejama Ebubu Plaintiffs a bond guarantee stipulating that First Bank of Nigerian (FBN) would pay them the value of the judgment debt and interests in the event that SPDC’s appeal at the Court of Appeal fails. The original bank guarantee is still with the community.

“When SPDC’s appeal failed at the Court of Appeal, Shell instructed the Bank to dishonour the guarantee, which gave rise to six different litigations in various courts against First Bank and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN),” he said.

SPDC’s explained that it had appealed the case at the Supreme Court, while the enforcement cases traversed Owerri, Abuja and Lagos, among others in six different suits, but Shell’s appeal was dismissed at the Supreme Court on January 11, 2019.

According to the governor, the judgments of the High Court, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court were registered in the United Kingdom for enforcement against SPDC’s parent companies domiciled outside the country.

He explained that the Ejama Ebubu Community commenced enforcement by domiciling the judgment in the State High Court and levying execution on SPDC’s moveables at their Industrial Area in Port Harcourt.

Wike pointed out that Shell offered the community N7b, as against the judgment debt of N194b, which it declined and went to court for an order granting the community leave to sell SPDC’s immovable property comprising OML 11 and its Kidney Island support base in Port Harcourt.

He said upon the advertisement of the said immovable assets for auction, the Rivers State Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice alerted the state government of the cause of a spill that occurred in 1970.

“That these phenomenal degradations and impoverishment had continued with the decline of revenue and inflation, lack of employment educated Rivers State youths, idleness and restiveness arising from want.

“That SPDC paid $2m for the renewal of its operatorship and interest in the said OML 11 to the Federal Ministry of Petroleum Resources.”

He stressed that in the past 25 years, the oil potentials of OML 11 have remained untapped following the hanging of Ogoni writer and environmental activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa, the Ogoni Nine, as well as the lynching and death of four Ogoni citizens, one of whom was Secretary to the Rivers State Government and a Commissioner under Lt. Col. Dauda Musa Komo as governor of the state.

That a lot of revenue is lost to the Federation Account accruable to Federal Government’s 55 per cent stake in OML 11 and by extension the rest of Nigeria due to non-production of 250,000 barrels per day of its crude oil potentials amounting to one-sixth of the country’s total daily output, among others.