The bribery allegations against Halliburton’s actions in Nigeria during the Sani Abacha dicatorship have been widened to cover the past 20 years and will include investigating Halliburton’s (and presumably Dick Cheney’s - see video Cheney exposed) relationship with Shell and possibly other oil multinationals operating in Nigeria.

Criminal investigations of former Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown and Root (KBR), for alleged bribery in the construction of Nigeria’s $10 billion liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plant on Bonny Island, have been widened to cover the past 20 years of Halliburton’s operations in Nigeria. Investigators will also probe accusations of embezzlement by senior executives, and Halliburton’s relations with other multinationals, including Royal Dutch Shell.

Halliburton recently dismissed two of its most senior executives, Robert Stanley and William Chaudin, on suspicion of embezzling $5 million from a Nigerian energy project.

The initial claim, which started the investigation some six years ago, was that Halliburton and others working on a gas export project conspired to win a $5 billion construction contract in 1995 by establishing a $180 million slush-fund to bribe Nigerian officials, and to reward Western contractors between 1994 and 2002, which includes the period when US Vice-President Dick Cheney was Halliburton’s chairman and CEO (1995-2000). Such payments are illegal under a 1997 convention barring bribery of foreign public officials in commercial negotiations, adopted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Tags:
Nigeria
Niger Delta
Halliburton

Sweet crude for shell, bitter oil for people

Part 2

Tags:

Niger Delta
Oil
Enviornment

Sandy Cioffi, director of the documentary “Sweet Crude” interviewed on Democracy Now!

In this small region of Nigeria known as the “south-south,” something huge is happening. The adverse effects of oil exploration have been unfolding in the Niger Delta for the past 50 years. Now, the people have had enough. From environmental activism to peaceful protest to stakeholder dialogs, nothing has worked. A new brand of militancy has emerged in a different kind of attempt to call attention to the desperate poverty and injustice.

Here, citizens of an oil-rich nation struggle to eat in a land that can no longer support them. The Delta’s water and soil have been fouled by the same oil production that accounts for more than 80 percent of the country’s revenue. Traditional fishing and farming livelihoods are all but gone. Potable drinking water is rare. So is electricity. With pitifully few clinics and schools, curable conditions go untreated and illiteracy is high. Families are broken up, as men die young or take off for the cities to find jobs.

The advent of militancy has brought both hope and fear to the region. People live with the constant threat of war, yet many feel that armed resistance is the only avenue left to make their voices heard……...Continued.

Links: Interactive map of Nigeria / Niger Delta

Slideshow

Tags:
Nigeria
Niger Delta
Oil
Shell + Chevron

W.TEC launched the Networking For Success Project in Lagos, Nigeria……….Future projects need online volunteers to act as mentors, and cash, books, software, computers. Contact W.TEC via their website.

The Networking for Success project will teach women how to use Web 2.0 tools and other ICTs to effectively develop and advance their work. Participants will learn how to use these tools to initiate and manage projects; as well as identify networking opportunities with other organisations.

Blogger, Rosemary Ekosso’s novel “House of Fallen Women” is published by Langaa RPCIG in Cameroon. Also the African Books Collective now has a RSS feed or you can subscribe to email updates.

House of Falling Women is a powerful story about the oppressive weight and irrationality of tradition, gender and class inequality, a desperate yearning for freedom and dignity, and a journey of self discovery, empowerment, and redemption.”

The Struggle for the City on mass evictions in India resulting in thousands of “conservation refugees”.

While many governments now involve indigenous groups in environmental conservation, India is on the verge of creating what might become the largest mass eviction for conservation ever. Groups like India’s Adivasis have come to be called “conservation refugees.” But many conservationists now say conservation initiatives are doomed to fail without them.

This reminds me of the eviction of thousands of Basarwa people from the Kalahari Game Reserve by the Botswana government to make way for diamond mines and more recently to make way for tourists… More here.

Two new Palestinian initiatives - Palestine Think Tank and Yalla Palestine both started by Haitham Sabbah and friends.

The Palestine Think Tank is a

site containing news, analysis, art and more to further the cause of justice for Palestinians. It concentrates on many aspects of the resistance, but also focuses on the issues affecting the entire Middle East. ………. Contributors include Khalid Amayreh, Ramzy Baroud, Adib Kawar, Ernesto Paramo, Wael Al Saad, Nadia Hasan, Iqbal Tamimi, Richard Jones, Nahida Izzat, Razan Al Ghazzawi, Khaled Islaih, Steve Amsel, Ben Heine

Yalla Palestine is a social bookmarking site for Palestinian news. I liked this short piece on the Nakba from Desert Peace “Palestine Remembered - 60 Years Later”

“We came and turned the native Arabs into tragic refugees. And still we dare to slander and malign them, to besmirch their name. Instead of being deeply ashamed of what we did and trying to undo some of the evil we committed … we justify our terrible acts and even attempt to glorify them.”

Tags:

Web 2.0 + Nigeria
Conservation Refugees
Botswana
India
Palestine

It is a question that bothers me–WHY? WHY do we ask WHY? Especially when we are dealing with issues of women and abuse?

While this thought has occurred to me for a long time, two recent discussions on “BBC Africa Have Your Say” - “Is Mob Justice Justified?” and another on “Pambazuka News Podcast” -”Interview with women in North Kivu” triggered my attention back to this issue. In the February 7 2008interview with female victims of sexual violence and activists, women respondents narrate their ordeal to a Pambazuka field reporter. On, “Is Mob Justice Justified” aired on BBC Africa Have Your Say Tuesday 25 March, most callers supported mob justice arguably because of police corruption and distrust of the criminal justice system. Opponents argued that mob justice could target innocent people, it is barbaric or it interferes with the criminal justice system. Do we really need to ask for justifiability of mob justice against a criminal or perpetrators of violent physical and sexual crimes against women? to ask about justifiability? Should we ask victims to heinous crimes to narrate their ordeal in front of news cameras, courts of law or even researchers?

Believe me, I am a practitioner and activist for criminal justice and allowing the law to take its course. I believe in the constitution and in the inherent rights of people as humans. However, certain things are simply too disgusting for me to fathom. Why should we give a chance to people who violently abuse women, whether sexually or physically to tell us why and how they committed their criminal acts? Especially men who randomly and recklessly abuse females during war, using sex as a weapon of power. Do these men have female siblings, wives, grandmothers, mothers or female friends? Should we really give them a chance to face international criminal tribunals to narrate how they violently inserted male sexual organs, sticks, guns or rough objects inside women’s sexual organs? You will excuse me for being too graphic but this form of abuse bothers me graphically. Why should we grill female victims of this gross sexual abuse to narrate their ordeal to us on Pambazuka news or BBC Africa Have Your Say?
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