Posted by The government of President Muhammadu Buhari is being sued by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) for failing to look into the operation of illegal oil pipelines between 2001 and 2022.
Additionally, SERAP requests that the Buhari administration identify, hold accountable, and seize the assets of those believed to have been involved in the illegal oil pipelines.
Chief Eric Dooh (who is suing for himself as a leader of the Goi Community in Gokana Local Government Area of Rivers State and on behalf of the Goi Community) and fifteen other concerned Nigerians filed the lawsuit on behalf of SERAP, according to the organization’s attorney Kolawole Oluwadare.
The plaintiffs also ask the court to “compel the current administration under Buhari to respect and protect the human rights of the people of the Niger Delta who have continued to suffer the consequences of oil theft by non-state actors” in the lawsuit No. ECW/CCJ/APP/53/22, which was filed on Friday before the ECOWAS Court of Justice, Abuja.
The lawsuit follows recent reports of the discovery of at least 58 illegal oil pipelines that were being used to siphon off Nigeria’s oil wealth.
The theft is allegedly carried out through an illegal pipeline that is connected to the trunk line by a defunct pipeline and connected to a location in the high seas where crude oil is loaded onto ships and sold abroad.