The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed an application by Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) Limited seeking the apex court to set aside its January 11, 2019 judgment, which affirmed the June 14, 2010 ruling of an Appeal Court, which awarded N17billion judgment against the oil firm over the devastating oil spill in Ejama-Ebubu in Tai Eleme Local Government Area of Rivers State in 1970.
The judgment sum with the accruable interest, according to respondents’ lawyer, Lucius Nwosu (SAN), currently stands at about N182 billion.
A five-man panel of the Supreme Court in a unanimous ruling held that the application by Shell was without merit.
In an earlier judgement on January 11, 2019, the apex court had dismissed an appeal brought before it by SPDC, seeking to quash the June 14, 2010 decision of the Court of Appeal, which upheld the judgment of the Federal High Court, which awarded damages against the oil company in a dispute over an oil spill at Ejama-Ebubu in Tai Eleme Local Government Area of Rivers State.
The Supreme Court justices in the judgement, declared that Shell’s application was an invitation to it to overrule itself.
One of the judges, Justice Centus Nweze held that after a thorough examination of the briefs filed by parties and the issues raised, he agreed with the preliminary objection raised by the respondents (victims of the oil spill, led by Chief Isaac Osaro Agbara) and dismissed the application by Shell.
The respondents’ lawyer, Lucius Nwosu (SAN), had queried the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court to entertain Shell’s application, pointing out that it was intended to make the apex court sit on an appeal over its own decision.
He contended that the oil firm’s application was an abuse of court process as there was no pending appeal on which it wanted the court to act on.
Nwosu said his clients had earlier written the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) to enquire about the status of the Shell’s fresh appeal, to which, he said the CJN declared that the appeal by the oil giant was a “spent appeal”.
Nwosu noted that the Royal Dutch Shell is often reluctant to compensate victims of its oil spills in Nigeria, whereas he paid up to $206million damages in similar circumstance in Mexico.