Case Wiwa v. royal dutch shell

Rianne van Mierlo
U n i v e r s i d a d E u r o p e a d e V a l e n c i a
Royal Dutch Shell in Nigeria
Wiwa et al v. Royal Dutch Petroleum et al
Paper providing information regarding the context, process and conclusionof the case
regarding RoyalDutch Shell polluting areas in Nigeria and harming its civilians
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December
‘16

Rianne van Mierlo 2016-2017 Universidad Europa de Valencia
Wiwa et al v. Royal Dutch Petroleum et al 2
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
1.2 Summary .............................................................................................................................3
1.2.2. Key Words:....................................................................................................................3
1.3 Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Shell ................................................................................................4
1.3.1. The Royal Dutch Shell....................................................................................................4
1.3.2. The situation in Nigeria..................................................................................................4
1.3.3. The Case of Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Shell .........................................................................5
1.4 Bibliography........................................................................................................................7

1.2 Summary
The paper related to the case of Wiwa et al v. Royal Dutch Petroleum et al provides
information on the subject of the Royal Dutch Shell as a company, including information
about its existence, purposes, and business. Furthermore, it will explain thoroughly the
situation in the Ogoni area, Nigeria, during the late end of the 20th
century, and how the
Royal Dutch Shell has negatively influenced and harmed its situation by that period. It will
shed a light on the actions on the people in order to fight against their rights, as well as the
counter-reaction of Shell towards the allegations as well.
To continue the paper covers the actual case of Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Shell, by means of
providing information given by the case statement of the United States District for the
Southern District of New York, including general allegations, claims, responses, and the
eventual settlement.
The paper is supported by an extensive bibliography in which all the used sources for
structuring and proof added to the paper has been included.
1.2.2. Key Words:
Wiwa, Royal Dutch Shell, Ogoni, Nigeria, general allegations, United States District for the
Southern District of New York.

1.3 Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Shell
1.3.1. The Royal Dutch Shell
In 1886, the British Samuel family1
founded the oil company what was then known as ‘Shell
Petroleum Inc.’. By the time the company was at its peak influence it had seized the power of
world leadership in the field the production of gas, oil, and petrochemicals (C. Powell, et al.,
2009). By means of a merger with the Dutch oil company the Royal Shell in 1907, the
company changed their name into Royal Dutch Shell Group. Shell Petroleum Inc. Being a
British-Dutch Oil Company, the organisation is currently headquartered in The Hague, the
Netherlands, with its parent company being situated and incorporated in Wales and England.
When focusing on the structure and size of Dutch Royal Shell itself, it has operations in over
more than seventy countries, including 93.000 employees on average working for them. By
producing over three million barrels of oil equivalent a day, the company makes a revenue of
¢265 billion per year (Shell Global, 2015).
Furthermore, the Dutch Royal Shell has divided its operations under four businesses. Firstly,
they focus on a business under the name of ‘upstream’, being the exploration for natural gas
reserves and new liquids. Secondly, the integrated gas and new energies business takes
care of converting gas into liquids and liquefying natural gas. While the ‘downstream’
business makes sure that the crude oil is turned into a range of refined products. And lastly,
with the business on ‘projects & development’ the Royal Dutch Shell highlights the
importance of new development projects and the exploration and research in order to make
these developments innovative and low-cost2
(Shell Global, 2015).
1.3.2. The situationinNigeria
The launch of the new Nigerian project of Shell occurred when it opened its business in 1937
by the name of Shell D’Arcy (Shell Nigeria, 2009). After discovering the first commercial oil
field in 1956 in Oloibiri, the Niger Delta, Shell was able to start its processes in oil exports,
which eventually came to existence in 1958. For the Ogoni people, the civilians who have
been living in the area of the Niger Delta for over 500 years, the concerns initiated around
the 1990s. Initially, their main concerns developed when they noticed that there was very
little money, made from the oil transports, transferred to the local people of Ogoni, and how
the oil industry resulted in environmental damages caused by the recurring sabotage of the
pipelines from the Royal Dutch Shell (Shellguilty, 2009). Royal Dutch Shell did not see much
chance of them being held accountable for the environmental damages. They knew for a fact
that the Nigerian courts would never take action against them, and until that point no one had
every held a corporation accountable for human rights abused in a country like Nigeria
(Shellguilty, 2009).
From January 4th
1993 onwards, by means of the MOSOP protests3
the civilians were
gaining more and more influence over the situation in Nigeria. The MOSOP movement,
1 Sir Marcus Samuel (17 Jan.1927) and family
2 More information on structure and/or business ofShell on www.shell.com
3 MOSOP Protestof Jan. 4th 1993 – Regarded as Ogoni Day in celebration of the declaration of1993 as the
International Year of the world’s Indigenous People

under leadership of Ken Saro-Wiwa, stands for the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni
People, with the aim to protect themselves and their environment from the damaging actions
of Shell. They highlighted several key points related to Shell D’Arcy: the degradation of
environment by processes of natural gas flaring and oil spills and the fact that instead of
vaccinating the gas back into the ground, Shell would burn it off or flares in into the fields of
the Ogoni people. They also pinpointed out the issues on overfishing, loss of biodiversity and
deforestation, water contamination, and air pollution from chemical facilitations and refineries
(C. Powell, et al.).
The result of the Ogoni people’s protects were the following; Shell began to realise the
growing affect and influence MOSOP was gaining and by being afraid it would jeopardise
their strategy, they sought help by the dictatorial Nigerian government and military. By bribing
the authorities of Nigeria, the military would in exchange suppress the citizens in an act of
violence. This resulted in the arrest, and eventually execution of nine Ogoni men, under
whom the leader of the MOSOP movement; Ken Saro-Wiwa. Moreover, the Nigerian
government caused civil disturbance by making $42 million in damages, and it forced the
Ogoni citizens to live in poor health and poverty (The Guardian, 2009).
1.3.3. The Case of Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Shell
With the beginning of 1996, Wiwa v Royal Dutch Shell was being filed by the Centre for
Constitutional Rights4
, Earthrights International5
and others, charging the oil company of
Royal Dutch Shell with complicity in human rights abuse against the Ogoni land and its
people, in the Federal Court of New York City. In overall, the case covers three lawsuits in
total: Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Petroleum, Wiwa v. Anderson, and Wiwa v. Shell Petroleum
Development Company. The involved parties in the case were, on the plaintiff side, Ken
Wiwa, son of Ken Saro-Wiwa the leader of the MOSOP movement, Owens Kiwa, the brother
of Ken Saro-Wiwa, and Blessing Kpuinen, the wife of deceased Ogoni civilian John Kpuinen.
They were charging Royal Dutch Petroleum Company and Royal Shell Transport and
Trading Company in the court of the United States District for the Southern District of New
York.
The general allegations of the case covered multiple claims that Wiwa accused the Royal
Dutch Shell Company of being accountable for. By means of summing up the allegations, it
will shed a light on execution, crimes against humanity, torture, cruel, human or degrading
treatment, arbitrary arrest and detention, wrongful death, assault and battery, intentional
inflection of emotional distress, negligent infliction of emotional distress, and negligence.
Royal Dutch Shell also got accused of the act of injuries to the plaintiffs being a practice of
violation of the human rights and/or committed together in conspiracy with the Nigerian
military and governmental regime (C. Wiwa v Royal Dutch Shell, 2009). As a highly logical
result, in case of accuracy with regard to the general allegations, the plaintiffs would have
suffered, or/and will continue to suffer harm, which includes pain and extreme mental
anguish and emotional distress (C. Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Shell, 2009). Having summarised
the former key allegations that have been made in the opening statement of Wiwa v. Royal
4 Centre for Constitutional Rights – dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the U.S.
Constitution and the Universal Declaration ofHuman Rights
5 Earthrights International – Protection and defence of human rights and the environment

Dutch Shell, it can be stated that, whenever the allegations were true, the Royal Dutch Shell
had violated multiple laws, statements, or declarations. In this case; the Alien Tort Claims
Act. This statute has been put into force in 1789, and with it came the right for non-U.S.
citizens to file suits against United States courts with regard to international human rights
violations (Center for Justice & Accountability, 2016). Furthermore, it would have also been
violating the Torture Victim Protection Act, which allows individuals to seek damages in the
United States for extrajudicial killings or torture, without taking into account where the
violations take place. Remaining violated documents, statements, or laws are the Customary
International Law, the United Nations Charter, the Universal Declaration for the (protection of
the) Human Rights, the International Covenant of Human Rights, etc.
The demands of the plaintiffs were clearly. They demanded an end to the abuse and
exploitation of the Ogoni people and their land, they requested compensation for the
environmental damages that were caused by the oil industry of Shell in order to be able to
set up a trust for the purposes of health, community development, education, and other
benefits for the Ogoni people and their communities, and they demanded oil royalties
(C. Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Shell, 2009).
The case was thoroughly explored and this resulted in duration of the case for over thirteen
years. As the time passed, the MOSOP community was raising awareness of the problem,
which caused global support throughout the 1990s. From all over the world people were
organising and participating in protests, setting up boycotts in front of gasoline stations and
strikes against the Royal Dutch Shell. The company started to realise there was actually a
chance that it would not be able to win the case, considering the great global impact and
anticipation it had gained. In a combination of the law, including the supporting prove, that
Shell had against them, as well as being afraid for the boycotts and the damaging Public
Relations disasters it had suffer from because of the negative media attention, the Royal
Dutch Shell decided in June 2009 to agree on the settlement. With the eve of the trial on the
8th
of June both parties came to the settlement of Shell Petroleum N.V. and Shell Transport
and Trading Company paying a total of $7.500.000, whereas The Shell Petroleum
Development Company of Nigeria Limited had to pay a total of $3.500.000, calculating the
extra costs with it, it eventually brought Shell at a total amount of approximately $15.500.000,
with the obligatory to pay within three business days.
To be in conclusion, the Royal Dutch Shell required compensating for all involved plaintiffs,
to establish a trust for the benefit of the Ogoni people and their land, and to cover a part of
the legal costs made in general. All of this took fourteen years to establish. Taking into
consideration how big the influence of Royal Dutch Shell was at the time, and how little the
influence of the Ogoni people and of MOSOP was, this case is seen as one of the greatest
milestone moments in the movement towards corporate accountability and the right for
justification of human rights.

1.4 Bibliography
Centre for Constitutional Rights (Jun. 2009). Wiwa et al v. Royal Dutch Petroleum et al.
Retrieved from:
https://ccrjustice.org/home/what-we-do/our-cases/wiwa-et-al-v-royal-dutch-petroleum-et-al
Centre for Constitutional Rights (Mar. 2009) Factsheet: The Case Against Shell. Retrieved
from:
https://ccrjustice.org/home/get-involved/tools-resources/fact-sheets-and-faqs/factsheet-case-
against-shell#
C. Powell, K. Range, and J. Williams (Dec. 2009). Shell Oil In Nigeria. Retrieved from:
http://www.slideshare.net/kran2796/shell-oil-in-nigeria-case-study
C. Williams, the Guardian (Dec. 2009). Shell must clean up for its act in Nigeria. Retrieved
from:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/dec/04/shell-nigeria-oil-spills
C. Wiwa v. Shell Statement (Jun. 2009) Statement of the Plaintiffs in Wiwa v. Royal Dutch
Shell, Wiwa v. Anderson, and Wiwa v. SPDC. Retrieved from:
https://ccrjustice.org/sites/default/files/assets/Wiwa_v_Shell_Statement_of_Plaintiffs-1.pdf
Earthrights International (Feb. 2002). District Court Opinion Denial of Dismissal. Retrieved
from:
https://www.earthrights.org/sites/default/files/legal/Wiwa-district-court-opinion-denial-of-
dismissal-Feb-2002.pdf
Earthrights International (Jun. 2009). Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Shell. Retrieved from:
https://www.earthrights.org/legal/wiwa-v-royal-dutchshell
Shell Global (2016). Who are we. Retrieved from:
http://www.shell.com/about-us/who-we-are.html
ShellGuilty (May, 2009). The Case Against Shell: ‘The Hanging of Ken Saro-Wiwa Showed
the True Cost of Oil’. Retrieved from:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htF5XElMyGI
The Center for Justice & Accountability (2016). The Alien Tort Statute. Retrieved from:
http://cja.org/what-we-do/litigation/legal-strategy/the-alien-tort-statute/
United States District For The Southern District of New York (Jun. 2009). Complaint for
Summary Execution, Crimes Against Humanity, etc. Retrieved from:
https://ccrjustice.org/sites/default/files/assets/11.8.96%20%20Wiwa%20Complaint.pdf

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