Caliann wrote:If Nigeria gets oil refineries and is pumping oil, they will have jobs, right? And if they have jobs, they'll have money, right?
And if they have money, maybe they will stop sending e-mails to scam it out of us? Maybe?
Oil exploitation in the Niger Delta is nothing new. Nigeria is Africa's biggest oil producer. Didn't do the people there any good. Pollution from oil production has destroyed the livelihood of thousands of communities that used to make a good living from fishing in the delta, but when the water turns to a brown petroleum sludge, fish don't like that at all. Constant oil spills have devastated the countryside, so even agriculture is out. The oil companies walk away with massive profits, leaving the local population poorer and worse off than they ever were before oil was discovered. And anyone who tries to do something about it literally risks his life, quite a few activists have been murdered.
As if the activities of the oil companies weren't bad enough, criminal organizations, who do nothing for the people, just plain mobsters, tap into pipelines, abandoned wellheads, even into oil-tankers, stealing oil and pumping it through makeshift pipelines to bunker and sell it off.
The vast poverty, destruction of the environment and hence income base of the indigenous people have led to piracy and banditry as the only way out for many, who attack oil tankers either to take crews hostage or steal oil, who kidnap oil company employees, etc., plus the odd bit of sabotage from non-profit activists.
Often, using violence against the oil companies and their employees is the only way that indigenous people can literally save their own lives, forcing the companies to abandon well-heads that endangered nearby villages through oil spills, toxic gases and old-fashioned fires and explosions. And don't believe they clean up fuck when they move out of an area.
The land there has been raped. The people got nothing out of it but loosing what livelihood they had. There was a British documentary about piracy where they covered piracy in that area, and showed the effects of oil production. It makes all the "scandalous" and "horrible" images of the Alberta tar sand pits look almost benign by comparison.
Search youtube for "Ross Kemp in search of pirates", episode 2 gives an overview of the situation in the Niger Delta.
If there were absolutely anything to be afraid of, don't you think I would have worn pants?
I said I have a big stick.
