Africa Speaks Reasoning Forum

By Chika Onyeani (African Sun Times,
www.africansuntimes.com  -  Where Africa
Meets the Diaspora)

Tuesday, April 29, 2003

Here is a piece of news that should chill the bones of
every African as our leaders continue to fight for
despotism, while the Europeans and America, through
their NATO, have decided that African oil is going to
be playing a major role.

Yesterday, it was the millions of Africans who were
abducted and brought to America as slaves; today, it
is going to be our natural resources, oil, which is
again bringing back the Europeans and their offsprings
in America, (North and South, including Canada),
Australia and New Zealand, who are again finding a
reason to recolonize Africa.

Let Africans and their leaders continue their
foolishness of squabbling and killing one another with
World War II guns. Our children, grandchildren and
greatgrandchildren ad infinitum will continue to be
slaves to the "master-race."

I have yet to see an African leader extend invitation
to NATO to send in troops to Africa. But they, as it
is heir "prerogative of choice," have decided they
would again invite themselves to Africa. When will
Africa learn?

The new African Union will be meeting in July to mark
the first anniversary of its founding, and I wonder
whether news like this will give them a pause for
concern. President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa sounded
the alarm some weeks ago when he said of the American
invasion of Iraq:

"The prospect facing the people of Iraq should serve
as sufficient warning that in future we too might have
others descend on us, guns in hand to force-feed us
(with democracy)," Mbeki said.

"If the United Nations does not matter...why should
we, the little countries of Africa... think that we
matter and will not be punished if we get out of
line?" he asked in remarks prepared for a conference
on elections, democracy and governance. Mbeki said
that there was no 'one-size-fits-all model of
democracy.'

Some African leaders accused him of over-reacting. Now
that they have tested their equipment in Iraq, and
have been stopped for the time being from going after
Syria, Africa seems to be the new focus. If you read
the New York Times' "The Week in Review," you will see
what I am saying. It is so mind-boggling. Well, it
seems Mbeki is already a prophet of truth.  Here is
the article from the Chicago Tribune:

"Posted on Mon, Apr. 28, 2003

NATO commander predicts larger role in Africa to quell
instability
BY MICHAEL KILIAN Chicago Tribune

WASHINGTON -(KRT) - NATO's global role is expected to
reach south to Africa to bring a new military focus on
that "hotbed of instability," the alliance's supreme
commander, Marine Corps Gen. James Jones, said Monday.


He also said consideration is being given to the
possibility of giving NATO a peacekeeping role in
Iraq, though no decision has been made. NATO has been
performing a limited peacekeeping mission in
Afghanistan. "Africa becomes more and more of a
challenge, and more and more of a focus . for the
alliance," Jones told a group of defense reporters.

He said the situation in Africa in part reinforces the
need for the United States to maintain land and naval
forces in NATO.

"We might wish to have more presence in the southern
rim of the Mediterranean, where there's a certain
number of countries that could be destabilized in the
near future," he said.

The nations along that southern shore are Morocco,
Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Egypt. Jones said west and
central Africa figure in NATO's future, too.

"Carrier battle groups and expeditionary forces may
not spend six months in the Med(iterannean)," he said,
"but I bet they're going to spend half their time
going down the west coast of Africa for a very focused
activity in that part of the world."

Central Africa has become a troubled and threatening
region because of civil wars, religious conflict,
rampant corruption and terrorist activity.

"Africa has really had a very marginal effort put in,"
said Jones, who assumed his NATO command three months
ago. "There are a number of countries in areas of
Africa that are clearly the main route of narcotics
trafficking and terrorism - just hotbeds of
instability."

J. Stephen Morrison, director of the Center for
Strategic and International Studies' Africa Program,
said Jones' pronouncement was significant and
surprising.

"There has been some attention paid to central and
western Africa," he said, "but there's not been a lot
of alarm."

A major concern for the United States is African oil,
which comes primarily from Nigeria, Angola, Chad and
Equatorial Guinea.

"Instability in the Persian Gulf and Venezuela has
strengthened a push within the Bush administration to
look elsewhere for crude oil," said analyst Jessica
Krueger in a report for the Washington-based center.
"West African oil currently accounts for approximately
11 to 15 percent of U.S. oil imports. As production
rises, west Africa may be in a position to increase
exports to the United States, and its share of U.S.
oil imports may rise . In this context, the sub-region
is receiving increasing attention from policy-makers."


West African crude oil production is expected to
nearly double over the next six years, according to
the report, from 3.7 million barrels a day to 6.3
million barrels a day. Morrison said discoveries of
large off-shore oil fields are expected to boost
Nigeria's oil reserves from 18 billion barrels to 32
billion barrels.

This is eight times the proven oil reserves of Alaska.
Total U.S. oil reserves come to 22 billion barrels.

But Nigeria has been torn by conflict between its
Christian and Muslim populations, as well as by an
insurgency on the part of its indigenous Ijaw people,
who claim they are being exploited by oil companies
from America and other western nations.

Armed Ijaw youths have seized a number of Shell Oil
installations and threatened those of other producers.
"Ijaw terrorists have taken 800,000 barrels out of
Nigerian oil production," Morrison said.

Recent elections in Nigeria were marred by widespread
violence and charges of rigged balloting.

Morrison said investigations by the United Nations
Security Council and other organizations have found
rampant criminal activity in west Africa, and that
some of it involves money laundering and commodities
smuggling that benefit al-Qaida and Hezbollah
terrorists.

Further south, in Angola, the International Monetary
Fund says some $4 billion in oil revenues have
disappeared. Angola, site of a decades-long civil war,
is also noted for corruption.

Liberia is also a point of concern. President "Charles
Taylor has turned Liberia into a criminal enterprise,"
Morrison said."


In Iraq, the smoking gun was supposed to be weapons of
mass destruction which are yet to be found. In Africa,
here is our own smoking gun already found:

"Morrison said investigations by the United Nations
Security Council and other organizations have found
rampant criminal activity in west Africa, and that
some of it involves money laundering and commodities
smuggling that benefit al-Qaida and Hezbollah
terrorists."

Emphasis is on "money laundering and commodities
smuggling that benefit al-Qaida and Hezbollah
terrorists." We don't even have clean drinking water,
yet we have enough to fund al-Qaida and Hezbollah.
Give a dog a bad name. Plus, add "rigged elections in
Nigeria" and corruption in Angola to the tune of "$4
billion missing." You have all the major smoking guns.
And it just so happens that the oil is concentrated
in West Africa.