Nigeria rights group files suit for block

LAGOS, May 9, 2018 – A Nigeria civil rights group filed a case Tuesday aiming to force the government to retake OPL 245.

“After the judgement in Milan the Nigerian government refused to do something about it so we decided to go to court. What we are saying is that the attorney general […] should revoke the license granted to […] Mr. Dan Etete, when he was minister,” Rasheed Adegoke, a lawyer for Human & Environmental Development Agenda, told Reuters after the hearing in Lagos.

The block is at the centre of a legal case that is set to resume in Italy next week.

In January 2017, a Nigerian court had transferred assets and operations in the OPL 245 offshore block, owned by Eni and Shell and operated by Eni, back to the government in relation to the bribery case. Eni and Shell subsequently initiated separate legal procedures to have the forfeiture declared void, and succeeded.

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