Abstract
Nigeria’s decades of oil spillage incidents in the oil producing Niger Delta region have been a source of massive environmental, socio-economic, and public health concern. Though the number one oil producer in Africa, Nigeria’s regulatory and judicial mechanisms have been greatly ineffectual in prosecuting polluters and thus inducing corporate impunity on a massive scale and continuous despoliation of the region’s ecosystems. The paper interrogated the Nigerian legal frameworks for accountability of oil spills and compared them with global best practices, including the United States of America’s Oil Pollution Act, 1990 and the European Union’s Environmental Liability Directive, 2004/35/EC. Using doctrinal and comparative legal analysis, the paper examined the loopholes of Nigeria’s system, including its negligence-based system, under-resourced regulatory agencies such as the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency, and dilatory and discriminatory enforcement mechanisms by the courts. The paper found that Nigeria’s decentralized legal system is reactive, and incapable of rendering timely compensation or environmental remediation. Thus, victims of oil spills face procedural and economic barriers, while oil companies exploit regulatory loopholes as well as jurisdictional ambiguities to escape liability. In contrast, the OPA and ELD adopt more stringent liability principles, establish fiscal assurance structures such as the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, and institutionalize public involvement to allow for effective response, restoration, and compensation. The paper recommended reforms of Nigeria’s environmental law, including the implementation of strict liability, the establishment of an Environmental Remediation Fund, enhanced institutional autonomy, judicial training in environmental law, and promoting public interest litigation, and raising the country’s oil industry governance to international best practice for sustainable development.
Dr. S. E. C. Nwosu, pp 88 – 103
