Regional Control

I didn't know there is oil in Somalia. Or the potential --

Yesterday (or today, maybe) a bill backed by the president of Somalia split the parliament -- According to an article on All Africa.com there was an even split and the speaker voted to break the tie. "President Muse's bill, entitled the "The Oil and Minerals Law of Puntland State Government," aims to award the regional administration the constitutional authority to sign agreements with foreign companies intent on exploring for oil in Puntland."

I did some reading about the history of the place. There have been ideas of oil there for a long time -- there have been suspected oil reserves for many years in Somalia -- all the war and the crisis there has deterred most speculators.

An article last year in the Financial Times explained:

"In the late 1980s exploration concessions were held by companies including Conoco and Phillips, which have since merged; Amoco, now part of BP; and Chevron. They fled the country after dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown during civil war in 1991.

The data collected by oil companies has formed the basis of interest in Somalia today. Range Resources, an oil group listed in Sydney, estimates that the Puntland province – which includes the Mudug region – has the potential to yield 5bn-10bn barrels of oil."

I didn't see Blackhawk down -- I guess I should. It seems that oil had everything to do with American involvement in the area.

So the question is, who will have the future stakes in the country -- and who will decide.

In 2005 the president of Somalia, whose bill was in question, "unilaterally signed an exploration contract with a small Australian company to explore for oil and minerals in Somalia's Puntland region."

Local tribes are against it. Parts of the government.

A split vote. It's a tough call -- who makes the decisions for a people -- for which people do they speak and who are the beneficiaries -- victims...

Dots... Conecting The

From The Washington Post this morning:

"There is no single conspiracy theory about why the Bush administration allegedly waged this "war for oil." Here are two.

Version one: Bush, former Texas oilman, and Vice President Cheney, former chief executive of the contracting and oil-services firm Halliburton, wanted to help their friends in the oil world. They sought to install a pro-Western government that would invite the major oil companies back into Iraq. "Exxon was in the kitchen with Dick Cheney when the Iraq war was being cooked up," says the Web site of a group called Consumers for Peace.

Version two: As laid out in an April 2003 article in Le Monde Diplomatique, "The war against Saddam is about guaranteeing American hegemony rather than about increasing the profits of Exxon." Yahya Sadowski, an associate professor at the American University of Beirut, argues that "the neo-conservative cabal" had a "grand plan" to ramp up Iraqi production, "flood the world market with Iraqi oil" and drive the price down to $15 a barrel. That would stimulate the U.S. economy, "finally destroy" OPEC, wreck the economies of "rogue states" such as Iran and Venezuela, and "create more opportunities for 'regime change.' ""

That article prints the following images from this website:





(in the interest of full disclosure, unrelated and unbeknown to me, one of the images from this site, "iRaq" not shown here, will appear in the next issue of Tuesday; An Art Project."

Another image on the site was this:



This Image from the NYTimes a few weeks ago, under the headline "Struggling but Grateful, Liberia Welcomes Bush."


photo by Lawrence Jackson, AP

“It’s easier to tear a country down than it is to rebuild a country,” Mr. Bush said in a speech at the Barclay Training Center, where the United States is helping to train soldiers so Liberia can replace United Nations peacekeepers with its own army. “And the people of this good country must understand the United States will stand with you as you rebuild your country.”

The last time I wrote about Africa Elisa, who works for Care, sent me to a website called "Pambazuka News, a weekly forum for social justice in Africa." I was writing about the praise for Bush in Africa, and how it concerned me. Them too.

"The Bush Administration's fixation on security and the "war on terror" is already escalating the militarization of U.S. policy in Africa in 2008. In his last year in office, President George W. Bush will no doubt duplicitously continue to promote economic policies that exacerbate inequalities while seeking to salvage his legacy as a compassionate conservative with rhetorical support for addressing human rights challenges including conflict in Sudan and continued promotion of his unilateral HIV/AIDS initiative. The third prong of U.S.-Africa policy in 2008 will be the contin- ued and relentless pursuit of African resources, especially oil, with clear implications for U.S. mili- tary and economic policy."

Just a connect the dots project today. What more is there to say...

Welcome To The Machine

It gets tiring. The bad news. Last night I had dinner with a dear friend/investment banker who's moved to Paris to combat his discontent for this country. He's taken all his money out of the market and advises his clients to do the same -- gold, cash, T-bills. He says we're headed for a depression. This would bother me less if three years ago I hadn't called him a lunatic for claiming we were going to go to war with Iran...

Maybe that's why today I was drawn to a story by Bob Geldof in the London Times on-line. Sir Geldof accompanied President Bush to Africa last month, rode on Air Force one and writes to tell about it. It sounded like fun.

I should say from the outset I'm a huge Pink Floyd fan. More, perhaps, Roger Waters than the rest of the crew, though I'm listening to "Wish You Were Here" in deference to those who may prefer Syd Barrett. Couldn't have done any of it without Geldof -- and he's gone on to do much more. I say this because what we are drawn to -- our admirings and private loves -- these our our biases.

I teach my journalism students that to write a really good profile you have to fall in love with your subjects. Not in a weird romantic way -- just in a way that allows you to absorb them -- with patience and respect -- in a way that allows you to be the conduit for their words and the experiences of being around them. This is a dangerous set up, though, as you have to work ever harder to let them speak for themselves -- where very often an interviewer will get caught up in the romance of the moment... these stories often do very well, but I can't stand them.

I'm sorry to say I found the article that way. Geldof is dazzled by Bush's wit, boyish enthusiasm for the USA and with the autographed M&Ms from Air Force 1 (Bush has his own M&Ms. You can order your own custom printed M&Ms here. Mars, please feel free to support the arts.)

"At one point I suggest that he will never be given credit for decent policy like here in Africa because many people view him “as a walking crime against humanity”. He looks very hurt by that. And I’m sorry I said it because he’s a very likeable fellow."

He is impressed by Bush's initiatives in Africa; says he can't understand why they don't get more press; thinks this president has done an enormous amount of good there. Sir Geldof was invited along because of his own work for the region -- which began, I believe with the "Feed the World" tour he organized with Bono in the late 80s.

"The Bush regime has been divisive. But not in Africa. I read it has been incompetent. But not in Africa. It has created bitterness. But not here in Africa. Bush can’t do oratory. He can in Africa. Here’s why. His administration has saved millions of lives and has helped 29m children to go to school for the first time."

Geldof quotes Bush: “Human suffering should preempt commercial interests.”

90% of Africa's exports to the US are oil.

Funny to think that we needed to move away from the foreign press and into the local leader to get look at our country a bit more critically...

The NYTimes ran a story on February 15 about Bush's trip to Africa -- it ended this way:

The United States is increasingly interested in Africa’s substantial oil reserves. Some see Mr. Bush’s visit as a means of countering the rising influence of China on the continent. On Wednesday, Mr. Bush’s national security adviser, Stephen J. Hadley, delivered a message to China to invest responsibly in Africa.

“Obviously, the continent is rich with resources,” Mr. Hadley said, asked if the United States is concerned about China’s influence there. “We think those resources need to be used in a way that enhance and accelerate the development of the continent, and we think countries need to be responsible in their activities.”