Kampala — THE OIL DEBATE
In a bid to stimulate the debate on Uganda's newly discovered oil and the sharing of the oil wealth, Business Vision runs a series of articles by Professor Kasozi, the director of the National Council for Higher Education. This week's article focuses on the new rush for Africa's resources...
There is a 21st century scramble for Africa. This is a new scramble for Africa. This time, however, the focus is not on either territory or political control.
The 19th century factors that caused the scramble and partition of Africa then are no longer fashionable.
The 21st century scramble is entirely on resources, especially the black gold (oil). Unlike a number of historians, I do not hold strong resentments to those nations or countries that scramble and take over other nations and use their resources.
Nations, like species, are always struggling to survive and make the best of their situation. To me, Darwin's statement of the survival of the fittest includes nations, people and companies. At the global level, nations are struggling to feed their populations. Fittest here refers to most organised and therefore better governed but not the physically strongest.
African nations must organise themselves properly if they are to defend their natural resources and interests. Unless we do, Africa may lose the 21st century like it did the 19th and 20th centuries.
Africa may be forced to give away its wealth for trinkets like in the past. Africa must negotiate very well to improve the terms of trade it uses to exchange its mineral wealth for other commodities and services. We must remember that at a global level, nations are in a constant battle for advantages to improve the lives of their populations.
The scramble for African oil
A lot of oil has been discovered in Africa since the 1990s. Proven oil reserves are about 117, 481 billion barrels (or 9.4% of global reserves). Already, oil constitutes 50% of exports and 65% of investments in Africa.
Since 1990, the petroleum industry has invested $20b in exploration and the figure is expected to reach $50b in the period 2009/19. This represents the highest investment in a single item in Africa. About 30% of this investment is said to be of North American origin.
The Gulf of Guinea, the "armpit" of Africa (i.e. the area from the Ivory Coast to Angola) has most of the oil reserves. The area is expected to provide 25% of North American oil needs in the not far distant future.
African oil is attractive for a number of reasons. First, with the exception of Nigeria, no sub-saharan producer is a member of OPEC which has been able to negotiate favourable terms for its member countries. African countries thus negotiate each on its own and cannot therefore extract the best terms.
Secondly, new oil wealth countries rarely have people with the experience, capacity or political strength to negotiate good terms for their nations. Uganda's foresight in training some oil related experts and determination to open a college to train personnel must be welcomed by all nationalists.
Lastly, in newly oil rich countries, there is no local competing company such as ARAMCO in Saudi Arabia that has the capacity to offer an alternative negotiating platform or option for the state.
African oil thus provides external negotiators with less hurdles to overcome. These have most of the cards on their side.
Causes of the rush and scramble for African oil
Two major factors have influenced the rush for African oil. First, the changing world geopolitical landscape has been a major catalyst for the rush.
A change in the balance of global power that is currently taking place where the East (Asian countries of China, India, Korea, Malaysia and Indonesia) are catching up with the west in production and consumption is creating massive demands on the limited global resources especially oil.
This demand increases the scramble for African oil. Before 2005, China did not import much oil from Africa. In 1997 African origin oil accounted for about 18% of the country's imports. By 2006, the figure had climbed to 25%.
The Sudan and Angola are the most established oil suppliers to China. China's trade with Africa have increased tremendously. By 2006, China overtook the UK as Africa's third-largest trader, with trade worth $50b.
The Malaysian oil company, Petronas is active in more than 14 African countries. South Korea has a thriving trade with Africa. Indian oil needs are expected to reach 5.0 billion barrels a day by 2010. The country has been searching for oil but has not been as successful as China in getting oil out of Africa.
The second factor is the West's (particularly the US) desire to find an alternative supply to the Middle East as a supplier of oil and to secure sufficient reserves for security reasons.
It is reported that President George Bush wished to reduce his country's dependence on the Middle East oil by 75% as early as 2025.
As a result, a flurry of political and military evaluations of the "armpit" of Africa were undertaken in the last 10 years by a number of western countries.
This included a bugled coup conspiracy in Equatorial Guinea which a son of a former prime minister of a major western power was thought to have known.
In a bid to do more trade with Africa, both the East (China) and the West have invited African leaders to their capital. High ranking visitors from both the East and West now come to Africa.
The western companies involved include the British/Dutch shell/BP, France's Total and Chevron.
Will Africa get its due from the scramble?
Will the coming of non-traditional trading partners into Africa enhance or increase Africa's trade advantages. Increased competition for African oil should increase the selling price of the black gold.
In the colonial and neo-colonial context from which Africa has operated for the last 250 years or so, the African traders such as Jaja of Opobo, had to sell to the master or their goods would be burnt, licences confiscated and directors imprisoned or executed.
Africa had no choice to sell its goods to the highest bidder without permission of the colonizer. However, the granting of political independence and the coming of other traders to Africa should help the African producer to sell his products at competitive prices.
However, Africa can only take advantage of the changed environment, an environment where he is free to sell to the highest bidder, if he is organised and educated.
Trading advantage can only be obtained if African states are well organised, well governed and have educated people with skills to negotiate and process the sale of oil.
It does not matter whether the buyer is western, African, Indian or China provided the terms of trade for Africa are favourable to the continent.
Unless this is so, Africa will not reap big from the oil bonanza. The 21st, like the 19th and 20th centuries, will be lost by the children of Africa.
Prof Kasozi is the Executive Director of the National Council for Higher Education
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[Daniel 11:14 ]] And in those times there shall many stand up against the king of the south(AMERICA / BABYLON ): ALSO the ROBBERS OF OUR PEOPLE shall exalt themselves to establish the vision; BUT THEY SHALL FALL !
* 16 European Nations . Met And Plotted On How They Would Rob Africa Of Its Riches.
* They met during two(2) Periods of time in two(2) places
* The General Act Of Berlin Conference (Nov, 1884 to February, 1885)
* Brussels Belgium to finalize SECRET agreements ( Nov, 1889 to July 1890)
* The Book King Leopolds Ghost (1998) by Adam Hochschild documents some of This information.
The following Nations (Households) - Planned how they would divide among themselves our AFRICAN Riches.
1) Austria-Hungary - Francis Joseph I Charles - August 18, 1830 -
2) Belgium - King Leopold II April 9, 1835
3) Denmark - Frederik VIII -June 3, 1843
4) France - Marie François Sadi Carnot August 11, 1837 -
5) Germany - Wilhelm II - January 27, 1859
6) Great Britain - Queen Victoria (Hanover) May 24, 1819 British Ruler 2nd
7) Holland William III February 19, 1817
8) Italy - Umberto I - March 14, 1844 -
9) Norway - Oscar II [Oscar Frederik] January 21, 1829 (Also Sweden)
10) Portugal - Carlos I September 28, 1863
11) Russia - Alexander III Alexandrovich March 10, 1845
12) Spain - Alfonso XIII May 17, 1886
13) Sweden - Oscar II January 21, 1829 (Also Norway)
14) Turkey - Abdülhamid II, - September 2 or September 22 - 1842 -
15) United States - Benjamin Harrison August 20, 1833 -
16) Persia (Iran) - Nasser al-Din Shah Qajar July 16, 1831
For centuries Black Africans have been exploited and exploited in the name of Islam. Then with the coming of the Portueses (so-called Christians) to Ghana around the 1440s , the so-called Christians started their exploitation.
The Black Athena (Part1) [ Spiritual Reparations ] URL [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4maNtzhL9Q ]
FRITZ SPRINGMEIER A Bold Christian Truthseeker The Top 13 Illuminati Bloodlines [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k73Q2_f4vKU ]
We Black Africans are puzzling. We have a bounty of riches around us, yet we persist in allowing outsiders to steal them; while we fight each other over trivial matters.
Just in case you're wondering, here's some Black Africans who have done wondrous things to change the way we live in the world.
For example : Garrett-Augustus Morgan invented the Traffic Signal to CURB (no pun intended) TRAFFIC ACCIDENTS !!!
* Buridge & Marshman - TYPEWRITER
* George Carruthers - X-RAY MACHINE
* George Washington Carver - PEANUT BUTTER - PAINTS PAINT STAINS ETC
* W.A. Dietz - SHOE
* Charles R. Drew - BLOOD PLASMA STORAGE SYSTEM
* Michael Harney - LANTERN
* Augustus Jackson - ICE CREAM
* H.A. Jackson - KITCHEN TABLE
* Isaac R. Johnson - BICYCLE FRAME
* John A. Johnson - WRENCH
* Frederick M. Jones - DEFROSTER - REFRIGERATION CONTROLS AIR CONDITIONER
* Jones & Long - BOTTLE CAPS
* Lewis Latimer & Nichols - ELECTIC LAMP
* John L. Love - PENCIL SHARPENER
* Tony J. Marshall - FIRE EXTINGUISHER
* Alexander Miles - ELEVATOR
* W.A. Martin - LOCK
* Garrett A. Morgan - GAS MASK - Traffic Signal
* Lydia Newman - HAIR BRUSH - Nov 15, 1898
* W.B. Purvis - FOUNTAIN PEN
* L.P. Ray - DUST PAN
* W.H. Richardson - BABY BUGGY
* G.T. Sampson - CLOTHES DRYER
* .W. Smith - LAWN SPRINKLER
* J. Standard - REFRIGERATOR
* T.W. Stewart - MOP
* Maxine Snowden - RAIN HAT - 1983
* Paul E. Williams - HELICOPTER
* Granville T. Woods - Roller Coaster
* Granville T. Woods - Telegraph Transmission Devices - Dec 2, 1884 Patents # - 308, 816 (7)
Thanks to The Black Inventors Museum P.O. Box 76128 Los Angeles , Calif. (90076) Phone (310) 859-4602)
Director : Ghanaian Mr. Hamza Salifa
Contributor of Information : SEESTAH Imahkus Nzinga Okofo [http://www.oneafricaghana.com/first_and_foremost.htm ]
The Swine Flu Vaccination Hoax - Explained URL [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbFxV_C8Yw4 ]
[Check Out :
3) Who Brought The Slaves To America ? URL = [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuzhnKy63io ] Or [http://wideeyecinema.com/?p=911]
WAKE UP !!! STAY UP !!!
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[http://www.infowars.com/infowars.asx]
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Life Is A Game. Have Fun . Luke 18:17 - Isaiah 11:6
Don't build your plans around the sale of oil. Plan to be the only continent that still has plenty of oil. Large amounts of foreign money do more harm than good anyway. The part that is not absorbed by favoring imports over local production is absorbed by inflating the currency.
Develop your resources slowly, protectively, for your own needs. Declare independence, and make it real this time. Help the overdeveloped world kick its fuel addiction. Fix your internal troubles with your own labor and resources. Food, fuel, clean water, sanitation, roads, hospitals and forests: You can do these things with no outside help at all. You have worker wannabes all over seeking employment. They're drowning sometimes in their search.
New Dogs up to old tricks : Oil issue added as course of the New Scramle for Africa
Up isnt down, a horse isnt a cow, slavery is not liberty and free trade will never get Africans paid. It is in short a hustle, a scam, a scheme designed to fill the pockets of an elite, residing mainly in the western world, at the expense of everyone else, especially us Africans.
So how do they run this game? Simply put, through the spread of the false religion of global capitalism, known more commonly as globalisation.
We are led to believe that the triumph of capitalism is inevitable. That this system will connect the world, through the free movement of trade, capital and labour forming a community of peoples united in brotherhood, equality and liberty. Capitalism we are told will lead the human race into a glorious future transforming the planet into a virtual paradise for all.
And for the more sceptical, the argument employed is that its inevitable and irreversible, so get with the program. To this, all that can be said is Bah humbug .
In human affairs, whether it is running ones own life or running a country the decision maker or makers envision how they wish things to be. Based on this they initiate action to achieve this aim. The institutions and systems that govern human societies are ideas which human minds have perceived, systemized and then communicated to others. These others are then convinced, inspired, fooled, forced or bribed into joining the task of realizing what has been perceived.
What I am saying is, things are the way they are because somewhere along the line, decisions where taken by a person or group of persons that this is how things are going to be. A decision of this nature always involves protection of an interest. This process maybe conscious or unconscious but is a basic law of human interaction.
Todays global capitalist system didnt fall out of the sky. God didnt hand down stone tablets, on which were engraved the laws of globalization. It isnt a higher cosmic law. Its an idea, thought up by a group of people to defend their interest: to get paid and powerful and stay paid and powerful.
The religious disguise is a trick as old as the hills. If god, the laws of nature or the all powerful market forces have decided that you must give me everything you own and work for me for next to nothing, who are you to question the transcendent laws of being ? If that doesnt work, the next step is to declare you a heretic and burn you at the proverbial stake. Effective, yes; sane? NO!!!!
Free trade is preached with a missionary zeal that makes TV evangelists seem rational and objective. God moves in mysterious ways has become the market operates in profitable ways. The miracle of free trade will distribute wealth, satisfy all wants and needs and eradicate poverty. To question this assumption in any way is blasphemy.
The truth is that free trade is a disguise for the business relations between the Western states and a few Asian states. The rest of the world is nothing more than an enormous slave plantation, supplying cheap labour and resources for the chosen few.
The slaves are given not even enough to keep them from starving but the mass hypnosis they are subjected to; the promise that this is progress, keeps them subdued and docile. The overseers who enforce this world order or rather world slaughter - our politicians, intellectuals and business elites - get their piece of the pie while we die like flies.
A definition of a slave owner is a person who through force (be it physical, economic, social etc) can gain control of the labour of others and use it to fulfil his/her long term aims. It is using people as a means to achieve ones ends. The process of enslaving others involves destroying any sense of independence, self worth and knowledge of self, within the psyche of the intended slave, in order to create a mentality willing to accept a life of slavery. This is why, for example, the transatlantic slavery involved such violence and brutality. It was a process of dehumanization, designed to reconstruct the psyche of the African into that of a slave.
This is why we accept the horrendous of consequences of globalization, why we blindly accept to open our markets, privatize our health services, our education sector, kill ourselves for consumer products and work for nothing and believe that it is prosperity. A human being conditioned into adopting a slave mentality, tends to be the staunchest defender of slavery
We are tools in realizing Western interests. The Western elite has decided upon a course of action, the false promises of the false religion of globally extended capitalism, is the tool by which the majority are lured into cooperating in their own destruction. The stubborn who cannot be fooled, are starved or terrorized into compliance. If they still stand firm, they are killed. Therefore, dont fall for it. Understand it is a matter of interest and if something isnt in your interest why should you accept it?
yaah its true but scramble and partition of africa are based into two factors which is EUROCENTRIC and AFROCENTRIC .When you talk about Eurocentric you mean all view put out by maxist based on capitalism ideolodies.