The Sapref refinery was sold to the Central Energy Fund for R1 in a deal that absolves previous owners Shell and BP of all historical liabilities. This is despite the massive environmental and possible legal liabilities associated with Sapref.

Built in 1963 on land zoned for black and brown communities under apartheid, the Sapref oil refinery is embedded within densely populated, low-income neighbourhoods in south Durban: Umlazi, Wentworth, Chatsworth, Isipingo, Clairwood, Bluff and Merebank.

These communities bore the health and environmental costs of the refinery for decades, but none were consulted about the recent opaque transaction that saw the Central Energy Fund (CEF) buy the defunct refinery for just R1.

No reparations or accountability were enforced for the decades of damage either.

As discussed in a recent two-part investigation into the deal by Open Secrets, the refinery was sold to CEF on a clean break principle, which absolves previous owners Shell and BP of all historical liabilities. CEF did the deal despite its own due diligence highlighting the massive environmental and possible legal liabilities associated with Sapref.

In that due diligence, legal firm Fasken warned that the Sapref refinery regularly exceeded the limits of its atmospheric emissions licences and...