Posted on 06/20/2003 11:09:44 AM PDT by dead
Johannesburg: THE official line on the US presidential visit to Africa is that it is aimed at strengthening diplomatic relations and showing solidarity with the continent's renaissance spirit as embodied by the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad).
However, analysts suspect that there is more to President George Bush's African safari than meets the eye.
They argue that Bush is reaching out to Africa in a desperate search for alternative oil suppliers for his country.
No official date has yet been set for the visit, which is anticipated to take place within the next month. Bush is expected to visit Senegal and Nigeria as well as SA.
The US embassy in Pretoria insists that the visit, if it happens, will be a follow up to the Bush administration's increased emphasis on its Africa policy, which has opened up US markets for the benefit of developing countries and committed R120bn to fighting HIV/AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean over five years.
But Catholic Relief Services (CRS), a think tank based in Baltimore in the US, warned that American interest in Africa was not only charitable.
Their report titled Bottom of the Barrel, released on Tuesday, revealed the fact that Africa was swiftly becoming a key supplier of oil to the US, which already imports 17% of its oil from sub- Saharan Africa.
Within the next decade nearly a quarter of the supply will come from the region.
The report was written by Ian Gary, CRS's strategic issues advisor for Africa, and Terry Lynn Karl, Stanford University professor of political science.
It conservatively estimates that sub- Saharan African governments will receive more than 200bn in oil revenues over the coming decade.
Sub-Saharan Africa is in the midst of an oil boom and foreign energy companies are pouring billions of dollars into the region for the exploration and production of petroleum.
Oil production will double and more than $50bn, the largest investment in African history, will be spent on its oil fields by the end of the decade.
The new African oil boom will concentrate on the oil-rich Atlantic waters of the Gulf of Guinea, from Nigeria to Angola, the report says.
Unfortunately, this moment of great opportunity could also prove to be a source of great peril for the continent, especially for countries whose history is beset by wide-scale poverty, maladministration and corruption.
Petrodollars have not helped developing countries to reduce poverty in the past.
Angola used them to fight its civil war for three decades and they supported one military dictator after another in Nigeria. CRS is calling on the US government to emphasise "respect of human rights, the promotion of good governance and democracy, and the transparent, fair, and accountable management of oil revenues in their bilateral relationships" with African "petro-states".
They are lobbying the US government to support international efforts aimed at increased transparency of oil revenue payments by companies to developing countries.
CRS is also calling on African governments to remove legal and extralegal obstacles to transparent disclosure and monitoring of the oil sector.
The are urging oil companies to support the international Publish What You Pay campaign by publicly disclosing, "in a regular and timely manner, all net taxes, fees, royalties".
Even compensation payments and community development funding should be made public, the CRS says.
US embassy spokeswoman Judy Moon says the US hopes that these lobby groups will give an opportunity for the principles of good governance, accountability and democracy promoted in the Nepad programme to take root.
"It seems Nepad is calling for the same things," she says.
The US supports Nepad, she says, because it realigns and stabilises trade policies. In such a secure economic environment, all companies stand to benefit and will no longer need to cater for bribes as part of their operational costs, Moon says.
She confirmed that the US government was looking for an alternative oil supply in Africa and was already procuring some oil. However, she insists that Bush's visit, "if it took place", would not be linked to the search for oil and this was definitely not the case with regard to SA.
Moon says the US already subscribes to Transparency International objectives, which forbid companies from paying bribes. Companies have been prosecuted in the past for unscrupulous trade practices.
Bush's Africa Trip Really an Oil Safari
Happy hunting George!
A point of curiousity. Did these people point out how the former president's African safari was more (far more) than "met the eye"?
Bush is reaching out to Africa in a desperate search for alternative oil suppliers for his country.
I hope so. That's how a pro-active president leads his country.
Time for a reality check, buddy.
If the US helps Africa develop its oil economy, helping them and helping us, why is that evil?
Because somebody who has money will get more money, silly.
I guess the poor should rig up some bamboo and clay derricks and get the oil out all by themselves.
Two things notable here. One, the article is soaked with the superstitious fear of private oil companies, and the second is the idea that they need GW to lead the way into Africa.
The oil companies aren't going there out of a desperate attempt to find alternatives to anything, they are there because there is oil there, and that is what they do. Oil companies do not conspire or plot to drill oil, they drill oil. That is their business.
They are the single industry in the world most experienced in dealing with tough foreign situations, because that is also what they do. And they are going to bring wealth in their tow, because again that is what they do. Of course, since African nations are socialist hells, like most other countries on earth, they will not see the full fruit of their wealth; their dictators will divert the money to government expenditures that will help mostly the ruling party. That can be predicted from the start.
There isn't a single free economy in Africa, which is not unrelated to the general level of misery on the continent. The poverty certainly isn't due to a lack of resources, as Africa is the equal of any other region on earth in terms of its natural assets, but stews in poverty due to its inability to establish and maintain the rule of law.
But changes will result that will benefit people regardless. Tens of thousands of jobs will result during construction, thousands of permanent jobs will result as the projects mature. There will be jobs at every level from manual labor to professional and engineering, and these in countries that have never had these kinds of opportunities. And who, without these projects, never would have this kind of opportunities. There is nothing more destabilizing that to raise a crop of college graduates with no jobs to go to.
And don't discount the effects of thousands of guys returning home to their villages with skills they learned on the project, welders and mechanics, plumbers and wiremen.
And projects like these always open doors to thousands, thousands, of small entrepreneurs, who will reshape the economies of those countries. It will not be fast, and it will not be smooth, but these countries will change.
Aid and Development people talk about helping to bring development to third world countries. Oil companies do it.
I disagree here. We couldn't do much about Arab corruption because all of their leaders are corrupt. But I think Bush could have more leverage with respect to Africa in demanding the oil revenue be put to good use. I think it's the only moral thing to do.
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