Obama on Wrong Side in Shell Oil Human Rights Case | Black Agenda Report

Obama on Wrong Side in Shell Oil Human Rights Case

03 Oct 2012

🖨️ Print Article

Obama on Wrong Side in Shell Oil Human Rights Case

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

“Shell Oil, which profits most from the Ogoni people’s degradation and oppression, claims it is just a bystander, an innocent party.”

When Shell Oil walked into the U.S. Supreme Court building, this week, claiming that it is not responsible for the torture and murder of Nigerians in its oil fields in the Niger River Delta, the Dutch corporation had a friend in the courtroom: the Obama administration. The U.S. Solicitor General’s office was there to urge the High Court to rule in Shell’s favor in the case, and to shield other foreign corporations from being sued in U.S. Courts for complicity in human rights abuses overseas. Obama’s lawyers also asked the Supreme Court not to make any decision on whether U.S.-based corporations could be sued under the 200-year-old Alien Tort Statue. A ruling on that question would affect some of the biggest corporations in country: Exxon Mobile, Chevron, Unocal, Coca-Cola, Pfizer pharmaceuticals, and the Ford Motor Company – all of which have been sued under either the Alien Tort law or the Torture Victim Protection Act. By asking the court not to make a broad decision, the administration is also protecting these corporate giants from culpability for rights abuses.

In Shell’s case, 12 Nigerians charge the oil company with being an accomplice to torture, extra judicial executions and crimes against humanity. One of the plaintiffs is the widow of Dr. Barinem Kiobel, who was executed by the Nigerian government along with human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and other leaders of the Ogoni people in 1995. Their homeland, the Niger Delta, had been turned into an environmental wasteland for the benefit of Shell Oil and corrupt Nigerian government officials, with the population living under martial law. Shell Oil, which profits most from the Ogoni people’s degradation and oppression, claims it is just a bystander, an innocent party – that it had nothing to do with the Nigerian government’s atrocities. But, of course, the Nigerian government’s murderous policies were designed to protect the profitability of Shell’s operations. Shell Oil created the nightmare in the Niger Delta – just as its sister corporations do all around the world, under the protection of friendly governments.

“Shell claims it is not a person.”

At the U.S. Supreme Court, Shell Oil argued that the United States should not “impose our law onto foreign countries.” What an outrageous position! Shell Oil imposes itself on the people of the Niger Delta, unleashing what is arguably the worst environmental disaster on Earth, and then asks for legal immunity.

Shell Oil also argues that it cannot be sued under the Alien Tort Statue, because it is not a person. Two hundred years ago, when the law was written, nobody thought corporations were people. Later, corporations fought for and got recognition as a kind of legal person in the United States, allowing them to claim the inalienable rights of actual human beings. But now, under these circumstances, Shell Oil claims it is not a person, subject to human law, but an entity possessing corporate immunities.

The Alien Tort Law was used to compensate Holocaust survivors who had been used as slave labor by corporations that worked with the Nazis. Shell Oil’s operations in Nigeria have also sown a holocaust, for which there must be no impunity.

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.

listen

http://traffic.libsyn.com/blackagendareport/20101003_gf_ShellSCOTUS.mp3

More Stories

Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Roe v. Wade and American Politics
06 May 2022
Pascal Robert is co-host of the This is Revolution podcast. He is also a long-time contributor to Black Agenda Report as well as to Newsweek. He joins us from Miami, Florida to discuss the recent…
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Racist Immigration Policy in the UK
06 May 2022
Glenroy Watson is a Pan-African trade unionist who is Secretary of the Global Afrikan Congress, UK Chapter. He joins us to discuss the continuation of Hostile Environment immigration policies in the…
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Workers' Struggle in Haiti
06 May 2022
Dahoud Andre is a member of KOMOKODA, the Community to Mobilize Against Dictatorship in Haiti, and host of Eritye Papa Desalin, the Heirs of Jean Jacques Dessalines, a daily Haitian community radio…
Danny Haiphong and Margaret Kimberley
Censorship and the War on Black America
05 May 2022
Erica Caines, Editor of Hood Communist and Coordinating Committee Member for the Black Alliance for Peace, joins the stream to discuss the New McCarthyism and its implications.
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
The Poor Peoples Campaign Dishonors Martin Luther King
04 May 2022
It is disheartening to hear movement leaders say they are inspired by Martin Luther King while also supporting the U.S. proxy war against Russia. Like all wars it endangers the lives of…