CHAD-CAMEROON OIL
PIPELINE
Everything Under Control?
The controversial Chad-Cameroon
pipeline, approved by the World Bank in
June 2000 and currently being constructed
by a consortium of oil companies including
Chevron, Petronas and Exxon-Mobil, is off
to a rocky start.
The pipeline, long opposed by Friends of
the Earth and other local and international
NGOs, will stretch 1,050 kilometres through
Chad to the Cameroonian port of Kribi. It
will cut through rainforest, Pygmy
territories and major food and cotton
producing areas. Resulting spills could
have an enormous impact on the livelihoods
of local people, and it is estimated that
thousands of fishermen will be put out of
work.
Dollars for Arms
Late last year, Chadian President Idriss
Deby revealed that he had used US$4.5
million of the funds designated for the
pipeline to buy weapons. This news sent a
jolt through the Bank. Because of the
well-known corruption in the Chadian
government, the Bank had imposed strict
accounting standards for the pipeline loan,
insisting on guarantees from the Chadian
government to ensure that its oil profits--
predicted to total as much as $100 million
a year -- would be used to improve public
health, education and vital
infrastructure.
This "Chadian model" would prove that
the Bank could overcome this African
nation's endemic corruption and that the
same approach might be applied to other
corruption-prone oil-producing lands.
Robert Calderisi, the World Bank director
for Chad and several other central African
countries, said he was "sobered and
disappointed" by Deby's action, which he
called an "object lesson on the need for
more transparency". In response, the World
Bank and the IMF temporarily froze their
debt reconstruction programme for the
country.
In response to this scandal, FoEI and
other NGOs wrote to the European Investment
Bank, which approved a $160 million loan
for the oil project last year. "The arms
purchases show that the World Bank - and
thus also the EIB - are not capable of
preventing such abuses," said FoE Europe's
Magda Stoczkiewicz.
Compensation Blues
Compensation payments for people affected
by the pipeline project went into effect at
the beginning of 2001. In spite of the fact
that the amounts received were modest
compared to the real needs of the
population, Bantu villagers were satisfied
with their compensations. The Pygmee
population, on the other hand, has not yet
been compensated for the impact the
pipeline will have on their land and the
forests upon which they depend for their
daily survival. In fact, it was only under
pressure from the World Bank that the
pipeline consortium hastily put together an
IPP (Indigenous Peoples' Plan), which
nevertheless does not come close to meeting
the requirements set out in the World Bank
Directive on Indigenous Peoples. The
Pygmees wonder whether the IPP will turn
out to be nothing but a smokescreen to
foster public support for the oil
project.
Striking Workers
A strike by the employees of one of the
consortium's sub-contractors in early
February illustrates that both national
laws and the commitments made prior to the
World Bank's approval of the pipeline in
June 2000 are being violated. It appears
that all important positions are occupied
by ex-patriots, and that Cameroonian
workers have neither pay slips nor working
contracts. Only a few months after the
inauguration of the project, the oil
consortium and its associates have quickly
forgotten their promises about job-creation
and their contribution to the fight against
poverty in Chad and Cameroon.
According to one striking worker, "The
payment they give us is miserable. We don't
get any premiums, and the methods used to
calculate the salaries are
incomprehensible." Another added: "Oil
industry people are piling up money to save
in the North, and putting the Cameroonians
they hire under a modern form of
slavery."
Silenced Press
Furthermore, according to FoE Cameroon,
Exxon-Mobil has forbidden local authorities
along the pipeline route, employees of the
pipeline consortium, and even the
consortium director to give interviews to
the press without the explicit
authorization of the oil company.
Information from FoE Cameroon, FoE
Europe and FoEI's December Bulletin on
What's Up in the International Financial
Institutions programme (B-IFI).
