Oil pipelines were deliberately damaged in order to profit from clean-up operations by employees of Royal Dutch Shell’s Nigerian operation, according to Dutch investigative outfit Zembla.

After an 18-month investigation, it accused employees from the Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC) of hiring local youths to damage pipelines and then employing them to clean up the mess they had already made.

The investigation alleged that both Shell and Dutch government officials in Nigeria had been aware of the claims since 2018, but failed to act.

A spokesperson for SPDC said they ‘are not aware of any staff or contractor(s) having been involved in acts causing oil spills in the Niger Delta.’

Metro.co.uk contacted the Dutch foreign ministry for comment.

Testimony about the supposed clean-up-for-profit scheme centered on the town of Ikarama, which has seen at least 30 spills in the past 13 years, according to Dutch environmental group Friends of the Earth Netherlands (Milieudefensie).

Zembla announced in its program, which claimed to have spoken to five whistleblowers, that ‘Shell employees profit from these intentional oil leaks by pocketing money from clean up budgets.’

‘The majority of the leaks in Ikarama were the result of instructions given by Shell Nigeria employees,’ it said.

While the supposed profits involved in clean-up operations were not made clear, Zembla alleged that the money was split between SPDC employees and the local youths employed, according to statements it says were provided to local police by witnesses.

A former SPDC security guard interviewed in the documentary claimed Shell supervisors and employees ‘split the money from the clean up’.

‘The recovery department from Shell sabotages the pipelines. If the clean up will take seven months, they’ll stop after only three months,’ he added.

The programme did not provide any figures on how much profit was allegedly made.

SPDC argued that all spills are assessed by a government-led investigation team.

‘Where sabotage is established, community contractors are not awarded the clean-up contract to ensure that possible accomplices do not benefit from such activities,’ said a SPDC spokesperson.

The long history of oil spills in Nigeria has made Netherlands-headquartered Shell a target for protest and criticism from environmental groups.

Since Shell began drilling for oil in the Niger Delta in 1958, millions of litres of oil have leaked into the earth.

The Dutch investigative programme claim that ‘the greatest oil disaster in the world is unfolding in the Niger Delta.’

Shell claim that 95 percent of oil leaks are as a result of sabotage, but denies involvement in the leaks, which it blames on local criminals.

Despite Shell’s global ‘goal zero’, which aims to prevent any leaks worldwide, SPDC, Shell’s Nigeria subsidiary, saw a 41% rise in 2019 in the number of crude oil spills caused by theft or pipeline sabotage.

The Nigerian oil corporation is a joint venture between the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), which holds a 55% stake, a 30% stake by its operator Shell, and 10% and 5%, by France’s Total and Italy’s Eni respectively.

It operates more than 6,000 kilometres of pipelines in the Niger delta.

Shell claimed that, globally, 263 allegations of misconduct were reported in 2019 through their helpline, and that 93 employees and contract staff were dismissed.

It is unclear whether any of these employees were based in Nigeria, as a country-level breakdown doesn’t exist.

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