Court Blocks Shell's Oil Plans; Coastal Fishers Win Fight for Wild Coast Waters

JOHANNESBURG, 14 AUGUST 2026 — Sazise Maxwell Pekayo, a fisher from Kei Mouth on South Africa’s Wild Coast, spent years fighting a project he feared would destroy the oceans his community depends on. Today, the Constitutional Court gave him and his fellow coastal residents a permanent victory.

Justice Narandran “Jody” Kollapen delivered the majority judgment, permanently blocking oil and gas exploration off the Wild Coast and striking down a previous ruling that had offered Shell and Impact Africa a pathway to salvage their drilling rights through renewal applications. Crucially, the court closed every remaining legal avenue for the companies to reapply or remedy their position through future applications.

Pekayo described what the journey meant for communities like his. “We, as communities, did not know that we had the power to challenge the government until we met and worked with them,” he said. “Without their support, the oil and gas would probably have already been drilled in these oceans, because even some of our own leaders were turning against us and offering our oceans to companies. But because of the unity between coastal communities and our legal representatives, that did not happen. We say: Amandla! Power to the rights of communities! Amandla!”

The case turned on a fundamental question: whose interests take precedence when development decisions directly affect communities? Indigenous coastal residents and small-scale fishers argued they had never been meaningfully consulted about a project that would fundamentally alter their environment and way of life. The original exploration right had been granted to Impact Africa and later partially transferred to Shell. Applicants, supported by Greenpeace Africa, Sustaining the Wild Coast, Natural Justice, and All Rise Attorneys for Climate and Environmental Justice, successfully demonstrated that the approval process had failed to genuinely engage affected populations.

Justice Kollapen’s judgment was direct on this point. “The enquiry cannot be reduced to a formal balancing exercise that treats cultural, religious, spiritual and environmental concerns as merely competing interests against economic development,” he wrote. “A just and equitable remedy should therefore not allow speculative or corporation-centred economic benefits to outweigh procedural justice where communities’ livelihoods, cultural identity and environmental interests are directly at stake.”

Delme Cupido, Hub Director at Natural Justice, placed the ruling in its wider context. “This case has always been about whether the interests and profits of multinational corporations override the rights of communities to effectively participate in decisions that will affect their livelihoods, their rights to a healthy environment, and their cultural and spiritual rights,” Cupido said. “The court affirmed that the right to public participation is not just about following a procedure and ticking boxes, but rather that it is about placing the dignity of our people at the centre of developmental decisions that will affect them.”

Eugene Perumal, Governance and Legal Advisor at Greenpeace Africa, underscored what the judgment rejects. “The apex court firmly rejected Shell’s assertion that the fundamental requirement for meaningful public participation could be applied retrospectively via the backdoor to cure a fatal illegality,” Perumal said. “This ruling vindicates the affected grassroots communities of the Wild Coast, civil society organisations, and our legal representatives who fought tirelessly together.”

Sherelee Odayar, Oil and Gas Campaigner at Greenpeace Africa, connected the outcome to a pattern many coastal residents know well. “For too long, frontline communities have been forced to bear the brunt of corporate exploitation without their consent,” Odayar said. “Today, the Constitutional Court affirmed that public participation is not a box-ticking exercise, but a mandatory protection of community dignity, cultural heritage and coastal livelihoods.”

By contrast with the narrow procedural framing Shell had argued for, the court drew on international climate law in reaching its decision, referencing the July 2025 International Court of Justice advisory opinion on states’ climate obligations. That reference signals that climate considerations must weigh heavily in decisions about fossil fuel expansion, and that environmental protection is not an optional concern but a governing principle.

The Wild Coast remains one of South Africa’s most ecologically significant regions. The communities there depend directly on healthy oceans and thriving marine ecosystems for their economic survival. What this judgment establishes, beyond the immediate outcome, is that procedural failures in consulting affected populations cannot be corrected after the fact. The question now is how far that principle will travel into future decisions about extractive industries and the communities that live alongside them.