IT is the nightmare that no one wants to see. Bahamian waters spoiled by thousands and thousands of gallons of oil.
The news came through yesterday morning when Acting Prime Minister Chester Cooper – standing in while Philip “Brave” Davis is away again – announced that between 5pm and 4am, a contractor for Sun Oil was offloading fuel to BPL in the area of the Old Navy Base when the spillage took place.
Initially, it was reported that 30,000 gallons of fuel had spilled, with that figure later upgraded to 35,000.
Let’s start with the good news, such as it is. The diesel appears to be largely confined in the bay by the Exuma Sailing Club, which will hopefully make the job of cleaning up easier than it would have been had the tides carried it out and along the whole coastline.
Sun Oil has also been very forthcoming in trying to help deal with the spill. So they should, it was their contractor, but their willingness to be on the front foot is something that hasn’t been shown by other companies in such incidents.
The chairman of FOCOL Holdings, Sir Franklyn Wilson, yesterday pledged it was “deploying every resource we have” to clean up the spill, and added: “We’ll do whatever’s necessary to stop it happening again.”
There should of course be a full investigation. Worryingly, Sun Oil was yesterday investigating itself whether the company that it hired to carry out the delivery has the necessary insurance in place to cover costs associated with oil spill containment and remediation.
That brings back spectres of the blaze at the BAMSI site in Andros, where it was later revealed there was no insurance in place at the time of the fire.
However, we must wait and see – an investigation is just that, an investigation that must be allowed to reach a conclusion.
Instead now, we have a test of our capacity to clean up a large spill. We are fortunate in the geography involved, and we are fortunate in the support of the company involved – so let’s get it done, quickly and thoroughly.
That this comes at a time when environmentalists are wanting to make sure that Equinor – whose site suffered a spillage during Hurricane Dorian – is made to cover the costs of that particular clean-up shows the need to ensure we have the resources and the will to protect our environment.
Long-time activist Joseph Darville pointed up some of the concerns yesterday. He said: “The fact is we got to have more commonsense so that we have the necessary equipment. Yes, we are going to continue to bring oil into the country. I mean, that’s a necessity. But these types of accidents can happen and, therefore, we should have all the contingencies for sucking up oil.”
If all is as it seems, disaster as it may still be, this particular spillage can serve as a test case to show how we measure up.
We ought to have a transparent investigation to show how it is possible for 35,000 gallons of diesel to be dumped into the sea overnight without the alarm being more swiftly raised.
We ought to be able to see how effective our cleaning crews are – let’s see how the water is afterwards and how well the teams have done.
And we ought to be able to see how our legal processes work in terms of liability, and whether any criminal prosecution, if required, is pursued properly.
But right now, we need to get that oil cleaned up. There seems to have been appropriate urgency in the government’s response so far.
Mr Cooper was quickly on the scene along with officials from all the necessary areas, and that should be applauded.
Now let’s see what Mr Cooper and his team are able to deliver.
Comments
killemwitdakno 2 years, 4 months ago
"had the tides carried it out and along the whole coastline." wow
tribanon 2 years, 4 months ago
The following information in italics has been extracted for the most part from a recent article in the US Edition of Bloomberg and provides very telling details about the extent to which our small nation is being exploited the gigantic global oil conglomerate known as Shell.
Oil trading is a very profitable business. If you manage to pay no taxes on it and can work from a Caribbean beach, well, then it’s corporate heaven.
Shell is Europe’s largest energy company by market value, has managed to tick all the boxes: It has a very profitable trading subsidiary, which pays not a single cent in taxes, in Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas. The little-known entity is called Shell Western Supply and Trading Ltd., ("SWST") a trading outfit dealing in crude from West African and Latin American countries. It’s a cog in the huge trading operation inside Shell that many shareholders pay little attention to.
SWST operates from its offices in The Bahamas located at: Lyford Cay House, Western Road, New Providence.
According to its latest annual tax contribution report, released last month, Shell’s Bahamas subsidiary generated more than $652 million in profits in 2020, making the Caribbean country its 5th most profitable operation globally. More remarkably, Shell achieved the excellent returns employing just 35 people in The Bahamas. Its staff worldwide numbers 87,000.
The year 2020 wasn’t an anomaly. During the 2018 to 2020 period, the oil major made almost $2.5 billion in profits with the Bahamas subsidiary — a staggering 14% of the parent company’s total net income over those three years.
Since 2006, the very profitable Bahamian company of “Sun Oil” which is owned by the Bahamian enterprise known as FOCOL has been the local marketer and distributor of Shell fuels and lubricants products throughout The Bahamas and Turks & Caicos. And the FOCOL/Sun Oil group is controlled for all intents and purposes by the very greedy Franky Wilson, a/k/a "Sir Snake".
Bahamians are paying exorbitant electricity bills and extremely high gasoline prices at the pump, not to mention the environmental and other costs associated with oil spills, while Sir Snake and his business partner Shell are using The Bahamas to mint huge fortunes year after year for themselves. Talk about The Bahamas being used and abused! Small wonder many Bahamians believe the political ruling class has sold them out. Not Good!!
tribanon 2 years, 4 months ago
This incident has been picked up by the international press. Around the world people are learning how the global oil and gas conglomerate Shell and its Bahamas distributor FOCOL/Sun Oil are responsible for a major oil spill in the Exumas in The Bahamas.
The area of the spill is one of the most pristine island and sea environments on earth according to many an astronaut who has spent time orbiting our planet.
And many people like me who have been fortunate enough to have experienced the magnificent beauty and mesmorising tranquillity of the area before the spill are most deeply saddened by this environmental disaster.
Bottomline: The global oil conglomerate Shell has failed to oversee and monitor the safeguards and preventative measures its Bahamas distributor should have had in place to mitigate the risk of such a environmental disaster occurring and the directors of the boards of FOCOL and its wholly owned subsidiary Sun Oil must be held fully accountable their grave missteps that have contributed to the disaster, with due regard given to the excessively influential role played by FOCOL's chairman.
Both our government, and the Division of Shell responsible for overseeing the distribution arrangements for its products in our country, should, as a minimum, be calling for the resignation of Franklyn Wilson a/k/a Snake from all directorships he holds in FOCOL and its subsidiaries.
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