Nigeria, one of Africa’s largest oil producers, would need $12 billion to clean up several years of oil spills in the Niger Delta region.

This revelation was contained in a report on Tuesday by the Bayelsa State Oil and Environmental Commission.

According to the Commission, two international oil companies, Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited and Eni, an Italian oil company, have been the sole culprits of oil spills in the Southern Bayelsa State for over twelve years.

The Commission said it started investigating the case of oil spills in the region in 2019 and discovered, among other findings, that toxic pollutants from spills and gas flaring were many times higher than the safe limits in samples of soil, water, air, and residents’ blood.

The report further blamed ICOs for neglect, inadequate road map, and strategy to end the oil-spills problem in the region.

“The report finds failures of strategy, prevention, response, and remediation by oil companies,” it said.

Several ICOs have engaged in age-long legal battles with oil-producing communities without landmark victory.

Meanwhile, the ICOs continued to blame the oil thieves and illegal refineries as the reason for the decade-age oil spill problem.