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OIL

Italian oil boss probed over Nigeria deal ‘bribe’

Shares in Italian energy giant Eni slid on Thursday after it emerged that the company's chief executive is being investigated over suspected corruption linked to a billion-dollar oil deal in Nigeria.

Published: 11 September 2014 12:24 CEST
Updated: 11 September 2014 13:41 CEST
Italian oil boss probed over Nigeria deal 'bribe'
Eni denies any illegal conduct. Eni photo: Shutterstock

A Milan prosecutor is probing the role of the CEO Claudio Descalzi, his predecessor and another Eni executive over their role in the Italian group's 2011 acquisition, in partnership with Shell, of the rights to a field known as OPL245.

The field has been estimated to contain as much as nine billion barrels of crude oil.

Under the deal, Eni made a payment to the Nigerian government of $1.09 billion (€844,000) to secure joint ownership of the block along with Shell, which had previously taken a 40 percent stake and had begun to develop the field.

Most of the money Eni paid was subsequently passed on to Malabu Oil and Gas, a company believed to be owned by Chief Dan Etete, a former Nigerian oil minister.

In an episode that has come to be regarded as emblematic of Nigeria's problems with corruption, Etete had awarded the rights to the block to Malabu in 1998, at a time when he was close to Nigeria's then-military dictator General Sani Abacha.

Eni confirmed that Descalzi, who headed the company's oil division at the time, had been placed under preliminary investigation by a Milan prosecutor along with another company executive, the head of exploration Roberta Casula.

The company said its executives were being probed after a British court on Tuesday accepted the Milan prosecutor's request to freeze two bank accounts.

According to Italian daily Corriere della Sera, these were Anglo-Swiss accounts containing a total of $190 million in the name of Emeka Obi, a suspected intermediary in the OPL245 deal.

Corriere said the court had accepted the prosecutor's argument that there was reason to believe the money may have been paid as part of an attempt to corrupt public officials.

Last year, Obi sued Malabu via Britain's High Court and won an order that the company pay him $110 million in unpaid fees related to the deal which brought Eni into OPL245.

Eni insisted the company's action had been beyond reproach.

"The entire payment for the issuance of the license to Eni and Shell was made uniquely to the Nigerian government," a statement said.

It added: "Eni is cooperating with the Milan prosecutor's office, and is confident that the correctness of its actions will emerge during the course of the investigation."

Eni shares were down by nearly one percent in early afternoon trading on Thursday in an otherwise broadly flat market. 

SEE ALSO: Weak European demand hits Eni profits 

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OIL

NGOs take Norway to European Court over Arctic oil exploration

Two NGOs and six young climate activists have decided to take Norway to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to demand the cancellation of oil permits in the Arctic, Greenpeace announced on Tuesday.

Published: 15 June 2021 14:18 CEST
NGOs take Norway to European Court over Arctic oil exploration
Northern Norway. Photo by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash.

It’s the latest turn in a legal tussle between environmental organisations Greenpeace and Young Friends of the Earth Norway on one side and the Norwegian state on the other.

The organisations are demanding the government cancel 10 oil exploration licenses in the Barents Sea awarded in 2016, arguing it was unconstitutional.

Referring to the Paris Agreement, which seeks to limit global warming to less than two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the organisations claim that the oil licenses violated article 112 of Norway’s constitution, guaranteeing everyone the right to a healthy environment.”

The six activists, alongside Greenpeace Nordic and Young Friends of the Earth Norway, hope that the European Court of Human Rights will hear their case and find that Norway’s oil expansion is in breach of human rights,” Greenpeace said in a statement.

In December, Norway’s Supreme Court rejected the claim brought by the organisations, their third successive legal defeat.

READ MORE: Norway sees oil in its future despite IEA’s warnings 

While most of the judges on the court agreed that article 112 could be invoked if the state failed to meet its climate and environmental obligations– they did not think it was applicable in this case.

The court also held that the granting of oil permits was not contrary to the European Convention on Human Rights, in part because they did not represent “a real and immediate risk” to life and physical integrity.

“The young activists and the environmental organisations argue that this judgment was flawed, as it discounted the significance of their environmental constitutional rights and did not take into account an accurate assessment of the consequences of climate change for the coming generations,” Greenpeace said.

On Friday, the Norwegian government unveiled a white paper on the country’s energy future, which still includes oil exploration despite a warning from the International Energy Agency (IEA).

The IEA recently warned that all future fossil fuel projects must be scrapped if the world is to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

The Norwegian case is an example of a global trend in which climate activists are increasingly turning to courts to pursue their agenda.

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