Though both Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) and the Joint Military Task Force’s (JTF), Operation Delta Safe, have blatantly denied coercing indigenes of Aghoro 1 community in Ekeremor Local Government Area, Bayelsa State to sign report on the latest oil spill, the citizens have maintained their stand that further clarifications are needed to convince them.
In oil-rich Bayelsa, Aghoro is a coastal settlement along Ramos River, which recently experienced oil spill from Shell facility in the community which polluted the river, farmlands and surroundings.
However, even though Shell has claimed completion of the spill recovery and remediation, a disagreement in the areas impacted by an oil leak on the Trans Ramos Pipeline within Shell’s oilfield is said to have stalled the release of Joint Investigation Visit report on the spill incident.
The inability to reach truce is forcing the community leaders, who participated in the JIV studies to determine the cause of the spill, subsequently declined to sign the report.
The community leaders based their rejection of the report on what they described as wide disparity between the impacted areas claimed by Shell and that of the community.
Chairman of the Community Development Committee, Aghoro 1, Chief Victor Akamu, alleged that Shell, in connivance with the JTF, had resorted to force and intimidation into signing a document they view as false.
