The attack on Palma, claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group, lasted several days and left a still unknown number of victims among the local population and among TotalEnergies subcontractors (AFP / Christophe ARCHAMBAULT)
A preliminary investigation was opened against TotalEnergies in Nanterre, where survivors or families of victims of the bloody attack in Palma (Mozambique) filed a complaint against the French hydrocarbon giant for involuntary manslaughter and failure to assist a person in danger.
After collecting the observations of TotalEnergies, which was leading a mega-gas project in the region and is accused of a series of negligence, and those of the plaintiffs, the prosecution will assess “the opportunity for a prosecution, a classification or further investigations,” he told AFP.
“This is a positive step forward and we are happy that the French prosecutor reacted quickly by taking our requests into consideration,” commented to AFP Nicholas Alexander, South African plaintiff who survived the attack, who denounces the “ share of responsibility” of TotalEnergies in this affair.
Anabela Lemos of Justiça Ambiental, a Friends of the Earth activist in Mozambique, hopes that the opening of this investigation “marks a positive first step in holding this company accountable for the deaths and destruction caused.”
Asked by AFP, Me Henri Thulliez and Vincent Brengarth, lawyers for the plaintiffs, did not wish to comment. The latter are three survivors and four beneficiaries of two victims, of South African and British nationality.
On Saturday, a TotalEnergies spokesperson referred to a statement from the group at the time of filing the complaint, in October 2023.
The company then “firmly rejected these accusations” and invoked “the emergency aid that the Mozambique LNG teams”, the name of the mega-project, “have provided and the means they have mobilized in order to enable the evacuation of more than 2,500 people” from the Afungi site, about ten kilometers from the center of Palma.
The Palma attack, claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group, began on March 24, 2021, and lasted several days.
Maputo only has around thirty victims, but according to the on-site investigation by independent journalist Alexander Perry, the toll stands at 1,402 civilians dead or missing, including 55 subcontractors.
Several of them had taken refuge in a hotel on the outskirts of the city, the Amarula Lodge, besieged for several days by the jihadists. At least seven people were killed trying to escape.
The attack led to the suspension of this $20 billion project. The group’s CEO, Patrick Pouyanné, indicated in 2023 that he hoped to relaunch it before the end of the year.
– “The danger was known” –
The complaint is based on two reports from consulting companies, established ex post facto, which highlighted the absence of preventive measures.
“The danger was however known, several villages had been attacked before the attack on Palma,” remarked Me Thulliez.
In 2019, a company competing with TotalEnergies, Exxonmobil, gave up investing in the project and repatriated its staff.
Military patrol near Palma, Mozambique, September 22, 2022 (AFP / Simon WOHLFAHRT)
As for “non-assistance”, Total is accused of having refused to supply fuel to a private South African military company, DAG, which had started to evacuate people from the Amarula Lodge by helicopter but had to stop, according to Me Thulliez.
TotalEnergies assured in October that it had provided the authorities with fuel for evacuation operations but had ruled out any support for DAG, which was then accused of “abuses against the civilian population”.
The carefully planned attack on Palma, a town of 75,000 inhabitants, marked an intensification in a guerrilla war launched in 2017 by jihadist groups, known locally as al-Shabab.
The fighting has since left several thousand dead and hundreds of thousands displaced in this province, Cabo Delgado, poor but rich in natural gas.
Since July 2021, thousands of troops from Rwanda and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) have been deployed to support the Mozambican army, helping to regain control of large parts of Cabo Delgado.
This investigation is in addition to other legal proceedings in which TotalEnergies is implicated.
In June, 26 Ugandans and associations launched civil action in Paris to demand “reparation” for various damages (abusive expropriations, insufficient compensation, etc.) linked to two megaprojects in East Africa.
Associations including Darwin Climax Coalitions and Sea Shepherd France also filed a criminal complaint on September 22 in Nanterre on the climate responsibility of TotalEnergies, targeting EACOP/Tilenga and more broadly its oil and gas investments.