Exposing Shell’s Blood Money in Nigeria PDF Print E-mail
Andy Rowell
Andy Rowell: 28 August, 2012

Hats off to our friends at Platform, the oil industry watch-dog. For the last few years, they have been digging around Shell’s dirty dealings in the Niger Delta. Last week they released a briefing paper, co-published by SpinWatch, which showed that Shell is still at heart of the vortex of violence that continues in the Delta.

The briefing paper, called Dirty Work, examined Shell’s security spending in Nigeria. It revealed that the oil company spent $383m over three years protecting staff and installations in Niger delta region. This represents about 40 per cent of the $1 billion Shell spends globally on security.

Shell’s vast operations in the Niger Delta are guarded by over 1,300 government forces, including 600 police and Mobile Police,  known locally as the ‘kill and go’ and 700 soldiers from the Joint Task Force (JTF), a combination of the army, navy and police.

It is these government forces that have a history of violent repression against protestors against Shell, with many thousands of Nigerian being killed over the last couple of decades, and countless others have been tortured, raped and beaten or had their homes destroyed.

Let us not forget that Shell has also supplied these government forces with gunboats, helicopters, vehicles, food, accommodation, satellite phones, stipends and large-scale funding throughout years of conflict in the Delta region.

In 2009, Shell spent $65m was these government forces and $75m on “other” security costs, believed to be a mixture of private security firms and payments to individuals.

Shell also maintains a 1,200-strong internal police force, called ‘supernumerary’ or SPY police, plus a network of plainclothes informants.

“The scale of Shell’s global security expenditure is colossal,” argued Ben Amunwa of Platform, who wrote the briefing. “It is staggering that Shell transferred $65m of company funds and resources into the hands of soldiers and police known for routine human rights abuses.”

Others were shocked too: “This proves what we in the Niger delta have known for years – that the air force, the army, the police, they are paid for with Shell money and they are all at the disposal of the company for it to use it any how it likes,” said Celestine Nkabari at the Niger delta campaign group Social Action.

Since the story broke last week, Dutch MPs have started investigating the allegations.

Platform has now launched a second briefing which expands on the issue, which ran in the Daily Mail over the week-end.

Platform’s new briefing is called Fuelling the Violence: Oil Companies and Armed Militancy in Nigeria. It details how Shell and Chevron have not only been funding military but also armed militant groups in Delta since at least 2003.

Indeed, one Shell manager admits giving ‘special surveillance’ contracts to militant groups in 2011, in an attempt to incorporate them into the company's security arrangements. As Platform point out, these contracts have effectively rewarded violence.

Both Shell and Chevron reportedly paid $300 per month to individual armed militants in Warri in 2003, enough to provide weapons and supplies for several weeks. An estimated 500 people were subsequently killed in the Warri conflict.

Documents obtained under the FOI Act suggests that despite repeated promises, Shell has continued making harmful payments to pacify armed groups.

As I said in the press release last week: Soldiers, militants and mercenaries have all benefitted from Shell’s spending, whilst impoverished local residents have been routinely killed, tortured or displaced. Shell bears a significant responsibility for its active contribution to human rights violations and must stop its routine security payments. It must also overhaul its contracting and community engagement procedures and clean up its mess in Nigeria.

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