• Shell admitted lying about dealings with Etete

A Federal High Court in Abuja, on Tuesday, fixed May 18 to hear a motion seeking to stop the Federal Government from entering into any Final Investment Decision (F.I.D) Agreement with any person in respect of Zabazaba Deep water project located within the disputed Oil Prospecting Licence, OPL 245.

The motion, filed before the court by Malabu Oil & Gas Limited, urged the court to grant interlocutory reliefs barring such agreement since the project would be located within OPL 245 which is still a subject of litigation.

Malabu Oil & Gas Ltd equally applied for an order of interlocutory injunction restraining FG and the Minister of Petroleum Resources from considering to revoke or revoking the re- allocation of OPL 245 granted to it by virtue of the 1st & 2nd defendants’ letter of July 2, 2010, pending the determination of this suit.

Meanwhile, Royal Dutch Shell has admitted knowing Malabu Oil’s Dan Etete was involved in the controversial OPL 245 scandal.

National Daily gathered that this admission after several denials is coming after phone calls between Shell’s Chief Executive, Ben Van Beuden and his then Chief Financial Officer, Simon Henry were intercepted, implying that Shell knew Etete was the main beneficiary of the deal.

ALSO SEE: CACOL warns FG must not kill Malabu oil deal scam

Previously, on several occasions, Shell had maintained its ignorance that Malabu or Etete would benefit from the deal, claiming that it dealt with the Nigerian government directly. For example, Precious Okolobo, a communications officer with Shell had said that the company was not aware that that money was to be paid to Malabu.

Similarly, Andrew Vickers, Shell’s Vice President NGO and Stakeholder Relations, said in 2015 that “As we have previously stated, no payments were made by any Shell company to Malabu Oil and Gas in relation to the issuance by the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) of the OPL 245 licence to Shell Nigerian Exploration & Production Ltd and Nigerian Agip Energy (NAE).”

“Over time, it became clear to us that Etete was involved in Malabu and that the only way to resolve the impasse through a negotiated settlement was to engage with Etete and Malabu, whether we liked it or not,” an official of Shell was quoted to have said in an email.

It is believed that the exposure of the intercepted phone calls is what forced Shell into admitting that it dealt with Etete indirectly and that the company would have continued its deceit otherwise.