"Due to the oil spill and accompanying fire, my land was destroyed: my fish ponds, my canoes, my vegetable gardens and fruitbearing trees that I planted." Chief Barizaa Dooh from the Nigerian village Goi, and three other Nigerians on Friday filed a lawsuit against Anglo-Dutch oil giant Shell in The Hague for causing environmental damage in his country.

The four Nigerians, fishermen and farmers from the oil-rich Niger Delta area, will represent their villages in court. Goi, Oruma and Ikot Ada Udo are among many villages suffering from the effects of oil spills related to Shell oil operations. The Nigerians say their livelihoods have been heavily polluted and that Shell has not adhered to international standards for 'good oil field practice' in Nigeria. Dooh hopes "that the judge in the Netherlands can force Shell to take the right action. That is where my hope lies."

Untouchable
Lawyer Liesbeth Zegveld will help the Nigerians. She asked Shell headquarters in May this year to clarify its role in oil spills in Nigeria but the multinational passed all legal responsibility on to Nigeria. There are some 500 ‘oil cases' before Nigerian courts but this could be the first time a large company will have to account for its actions in an its home country. "Shell hardly notices Nigerian court orders but with this case a Dutch court can ensure that justice is done against Royal Dutch Shell."

"Shell headquarters believes it is untouchable, but we believe it is legally responsible for damage caused in Nigeria," Zegveld says. "Shell headquarters has the authority and control to ensure that its oil spills in Nigeria are prevented and cleaned up. We accuse Shell of negligence."

Friends of the Earth Netherlands also supports the Nigerians. A spokesperson says "Here Shell would never treat people and the environment in the way it does in Nigeria. We hope that the Dutch judge will decide that Shell must clean up the pollution and that the victims must be compensated properly."

Oruma
In June 2005, a pipeline surveillance company, contracted by Shell, discovered an oil spill from a high pressure pipeline operated by Shell, in Oruma. The oil spread into many fish ponds, in which Alali Efanga had grown young fish. All his lobsters, oysters, crabs and prawns died, leaving the community members with little food and income for many years.

Around the fish ponds were hundreds of trees, which served as a wind shield. Most of these trees also died or stopped bearing fruit due to the oil pollution and moreover, due to the clean-up operations which took place some months after the spill.

Some four months after the leakage, a Shell-contractor came to clean up the spill. Dozens of pits were dug in which polluted soil was dumped and were set on fire, which damaged nearby trees. The contractor also set some polluted soil on fire without digging pits first, thereby also burning several trees.

Alali Efanga inherited the fish ponds from my his late father. "Since the spill I have lost most of my income. Now we live from hand to mouth: sometimes I go into the bush, sometimes a company gives me a day's work for 500 Naira (3 euro)," he says. "We want Shell- headquarters to take its responsibility. That is why we are ready to take this matter to court in the Netherlands."

Oil-spills
Recent studies of the soil in the villages of the Nigerian plaintiffs show that up to three years after the oil-spills, soil and water still contained too much oil for it to be used for agriculture or fishing. Investigations by an American professor and oil spills expert, Rick Steiner, show that Shell did not meet international standards for 'good oil field practice' in Nigeria.

Shell's oil production in Nigeria causes on average five oil spills per week, in an area that is smaller than the Netherlands. Every spill releases on average 16 thousand litres of crude oil into the environment. According to Shell a third of the spills in Nigeria are caused by human mistakes and inadequate maintenance of the oil installations, and two thirds are caused by sabotage.