According to recent Nigerian media reports and a statement by the oil regulator itself, the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) has cancelled the approval for TotalEnergies $860 million sale of its share in the Renaissance Africa Energy Company Joint Venture to Chappal Energies. The Joint Venture was managed by Shell prior to the sale of the Shell Petroleum Development Company to Renaissance.
Although public details are scarce as to the collapse of the Total-Chappal deal, media reports record the NUPRC spokesperson as confirming that Chappal Energies failed to raise the funds, and as a result TotalEnergies reportedly did not fulfil its requirement to pay regulatory fees and cover funds for environmental rehabilitation and future liabilities.
In a reaction to the development, a group of 106 representatives of Nigerian and international civil society organisations, community groups and concerned citizens has welcomed NUPRC’s enforcement of the regulations it is mandated to enforce but regretted that it has taken months for the decision to enter the public domain.
“The Nigerian public has a right to be informed of such developments as and when they occur,” the campaigners stated.
They went further: “Now that the Total-Chappal deal has been revealed to have been founded on sand, the question arises why did the deal obtain ministerial consent in the first place? And, if Ministers gave approval for a deal that was without foundation, what other permissions have been similarly granted?
“In particular, the cancellation of the Total-Chappal sale calls into question President Tinubu’s decision to over-rule NUPRC’s advice that the sale of SPDC to Renaissance did not meet the regulatory requirements. That advice is understood to have rested on concerns over Renaissance’s technical and financial ability to pay for the historic liabilities of SPDC for cleaning up pollution from its operations and facilities, which are likely to run into tens of billions of dollars.
“We therefore call for the Shell-Renaissance deal to be subject to independent review. If NUPRC’s concerns were indeed well founded, there is a huge risk that the Nigerian people will end up having to pick up the tab for cleaning up SPDC’s mess. We also call for the release of the Environmental Evaluation Studies (EES) for each sale, and also the S&P assessment that was reportedly commissioned by NUPRC to assess the sale of SPDC to Renaissance.
“Democracy is not a spectator sport. It rests on the active involvement of citizens. As we mark the posthumous birthday of Ken Saro-Wiwa on 10th October and approach the 30-year memorial of the Ogoni-9, we demand action against these companies and their abusive practices.
“We call on civil society groups and parliamentarians to take up the call for the government to take urgent measures to ensure that the legacy of pollution caused by international oil companies is immediately cleaned up to international standards. And that the companies pay, not the Nigerian state and its peoples. It is unacceptable that the companies should profit at the expense of Nigeria.”