What is Paul Wolfowitz Up to in Chad?
…So Wolfowitz was moved over to control the World Bank’s billions. And he is now back in the news for having suspended loans to the sub- Saharan African country of Chad, one of the poorest nations in the world. The bank announced on Jan. 6 that it was withholding all new loans to Chad and was even suspending a $124 million loan already set aside.
Most of the money was for an ongoing project to build an oil pipeline from Chad to Cameroon so Exxon-Mobil can exploit Chad’s petroleum reserves. Shortly after Wolfowitz’s confirmation, Daphne Eviatar had written prophetically that “Now, a leading architect of U.S. foreign policy would be in a position to pressure the world’s largest public financial institution to help pay for the exploration, drilling and transport of America’s most coveted natural resource.” (Salon, April 26, 2005)
So why is the money being frozen? Wolfowitz says it is because the Chad government doesn’t want to spend enough of its oil earnings on alleviating poverty.
Incredible. How many times have we heard similar statements from the representatives of the rapacious imperialists who have sucked the wealth out of the colonized and neo-colonized parts of the world for centuries now? They exhibit no shame at all. Wringing their hands, they castigate Third World governments for not caring about their people—the way the imperialist bankers and industrialists do, of course.
Wolfowitz has seized on a law recently passed by Chad’s parliament that would allow the government to dip into a $30 million fund generated by the oil revenues. According to the World Bank, Chad had agreed to this fund, which sets aside 10 percent of its oil revenues in trust “for future generations,” as a condition for getting the loans to build the pipeline. Under the new law, this money can now be used for current expenses.
According to a Jan. 9 Reuters dispatch, “Among the world’s five poorest countries, Chad regularly has difficulty paying its civil servants and regions in the east and south have had to absorb at least 240,000 refugees from neighboring Sudan and Central African Republic.” There is fighting along its northern border, and its army is weak.
Meanwhile, the U.S. is building new military bases in Africa, particularly in areas where there is oil. The largest is in Sao Tome and Principe on the petroleum-rich Gulf of Guinea.
Obviously, Chad is strapped for cash, even though it has become an oil producer. Some members of its legislature, who voted for the new law 119 to 13, said that the terms demanded by the World Bank were a violation of their country’s sovereignty.
The World Bank is not going to hold up the construction of the pipeline. That’s not what ExxonMobil wants.
This move by Wolfowitz can only be seen as pressure on the government of Chad to force it to do something it hasn’t wanted to do. It may be some time before the real issues in this struggle are exposed. But one thing is for sure: it has nothing to do with the bank’s concern for “future generations.”
globalresearch.ca
Exxon profit tops $10 billion, capping record year
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM), the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, reported a quarterly profit of $10.7 billion on Monday, rounding out the most profitable year in U.S. corporate history.
The results pushed up Exxon’s profit for the year to a staggering $36.13 billion — bigger than the economies of 125 of the 184 countries ranked by the World Bank. Profit rose 42 percent from 2004, largely due to soaring oil and gas prices.