Access To Justice Files 3.215 Billion Naira Lawsuit Against The NNPC/PPMC/FGN Over Ossisioma Ngwa Pipelines Fire Explosions

Access to Justice has dragged the Nigeria National Corporation (NNPC), the Pipelines Product Marketing Company (PPMC) and Federal Government to court.

In a statement signed by its Senior Programme Officer, Chinelo Chiweze, and made available to TheNigeriaLawyer (TNL), Access to Justice says “On the 12^th day of October 2018, a system 2E petroleum pipeline belonging to the Nigeria National Corporation (NNPC) and managed by its subsidiary, the Pipelines Product Marketing Company (PPMC) caught fire and exploded in the Ossisioma Ngwa community of Abia State resulting in a massive conflagration that burnt and destroyed several human/animal lives and properties in the community. Alongside the human fatalities, the inferno caused blistering devastation to several residents of Umuaduru and Umuimo villages as well as residents of Uratta, Umuze and Njiko Umunna Autonomous Communities in Ossisioma Ngwa Local Government Area/Community of Abia State.”

It Laments that “Unfortunately, on October 20^th 2018, the President Buhari, through his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu issued a press statement claiming that the explosions was likely caused by suspected oil thieves. This claim was made well before the federal government or the NNPC had conducted a thorough, impartial and independent investigation into the cause, manner and circumstances of the incident as required under the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and other International Treaties to which the federal government of Nigeria is a party, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

“Since that unfortunate incident, nothing further, as far as Access to Justice is aware, has been published concerning that tragic event, either by the NNPC, PPMC or the federal government of Nigeria. All three parties have swept the matter under the rug, leaving thousands of people affected by the explosions, directly or indirectly, to bear alone the brutal and horrifying consequences of that calamity. Even the federal government which has a non-derogable duty to protect the lives of Nigerian people did not lift a finger to interrogate the role of the oil establishment in the unfortunate calamities, but chose to side with the impunity with which they behaved.”

In view of the turn of events, Access to Justice “On behalf of some of the affected families of the victims of the pipeline explosions, Access to Justice, on Thursday 10^th October 2019, filed a lawsuit against the Pipelines Product Marketing Company (PPMC), the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and the Federal Republic of Nigeria (FGN). The action (with Suit No. HOS/88/2019) was filed at the Ossisioma division of the Abia State High Court by Messrs. Joseph Otteh Esq. and Daniel Aloaye Esq. (counsel).

“The lawsuit alleges that the Oil companies were complicit and negligent in the series of events that led to the pipeline explosions in Ossisioma Ngwa communities that caused large-scale devastation to those communities following the pipeline explosions. It claims that the oil companies, in the aftermath of the occurrence of the tragic incidents  treated the victims, many of whom suffered extreme, blistering burns and were at serious risk of death, with cold-blooded indifference: the oil companies did not provide relief supplies or materials, did not offer life-saving medical care or treatment, and did not extend any financial help or compensation to families who desperately needed assistance, or lost bread-winners, neither did they offer the simplest forms of emotional comfort like visiting families affected by the tragedy.”

The full statement reads in part:

“By this lawsuit, Access to Justice aims to hold both the federal government and the oil companies to account, through the judicial process, for the role they have played in wrecking and traumatizing the lives of members of the Ossisioma Ngwa community, and abandoning them afterwards. Access to Justice expects that there will, ultimately, be a day of reckoning for the impunity of both the government and the oil corporations towards the Ossisioma Ngwa population, and a day of justice for the victims of the pipeline explosions whose lives have been broken so horrendously and disdainfully by government and Nigeria’s State oil corporations.

“The reliefs sought by the suit include, in summary form:

1. An Order for the payment of Exemplary/Aggravated Damages against the Defendants jointly and severally in the sum of N3, 000,000,000.00 (Three Billion Naira).

2. An Order of Special Damages against the Defendants, jointly and severally, in the sum of N15, 000,000.00 (Fifteen Million Naira).
3. AN ORDER directing the Defendants to pay the Claimants jointly and severally the sum of One Billion, Two Hundred Million Naira (N1,200,000,000) as general damages to alleviate the unqualifiable physical, emotional, psychological trauma and agony the Claimants have suffered following the pipeline fire explosions, owing to deliberate and/or negligent acts of the Defendant.”