Off the Wild Coast of South Africa's Eastern Cape, a decade-long contest between commercial ambition and constitutional dignity has reached its end. The Constitutional Court has permanently extinguished Shell and Impact Africa's oil and gas exploration right, ruling that communities whose fishing grounds, spiritual practices, and cultural heritage were never properly consulted cannot be made whole by belated process. The court's message is ancient in its simplicity: some wrongs cannot be undone by doing late what was owed from the beginning, and no sum of money can purchase retroactive legitim
Constitutional Court kills Shell's R1.1bn Wild Coast oil exploration plan
Wild Coast communities' customary fishing rights, spiritual practices, and cultural heritage were violated through unlawful exploration processes that proceeded without their informed consent or proper consultation.