POLITICS-EQUATORIAL GUINEA: Have Oil, Will Get US Attention

By Jim Lobe Reprint | | Print |

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Jul 25 2000 (IPS) - Equatorial Guinea was long seen as the ultimate hardship post at the State Department, especially after one US diplomat stabbed his only colleague there to death with a pair of scissors nearly 30 years ago.

That was when Francisco Macias Nguema, as bloody a dictator as could be found on the African continent at the time, still ran the country.

But that was also before vast deep-water oil reserves were discovered in the Gulf of Guinea, which surrounds the West African nation’s islands.

Those reserves, which, thanks to recent advances in drilling technology, can now be affordably exploited, have converted Malabo, the capital, from a sleepy and dirt-poor backwater, to the place to be in the West African oil rush that is drawing billions of dollars in foreign – mainly US – investment.

Since ExxonMobil made its initial find in 1995 – ironically, just a few weeks after Washington finally closed its embassy in Malabo as a cost-saving measure – US companies have poured nearly 5 billion dollars into Equatorial Guinea, according to the latest estimates – more than enough to make the United States the biggest investor by far in the former Spanish colony of some 350,000 people.

“They’re sitting on phenomenal wealth,” says Stephen Hayes, president of the Corporate Council on Africa (CCA) here. “Economically, Equatorial Guinea is becoming very important to the United States, as is much of West Africa,” he notes, adding that Washington should now consider re-opening its embassy in Malabo.

US officials say that may still take some time to happen due to financial constraints on the State Department budget, but they don’t deny that US interests in Equatorial Guinea are increasing, and very rapidly at that.

The country’s oil production could eclipse those of Congo and Cameroon in a matter of just a few years. It has risen from nothing in 1997 to about 130,000 barrels a day today, and could well exceed 200,000 by 2005, according to recent estimates.

In addition to ExxonMobil, the main oil producer now, Triton Energy, which discovered another reserve of almost 500 million barrels last October, began pumping last month. Three other Texas- based companies, Samedan Oil, CMS Energy, and Vanco, are also active in the country.

Where US oil capital goes, the government, despite wariness over Malabo’s not-much-improved human-rights performance, is not far behind.

In just the last month, Washington’s Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), approved its largest-ever package for a project in sub-Saharan Africa: a total of 373 million dollars in guarantees and insurance for the construction and operation of a 450-million-dollar methanol plant on the island of Bioko.

Ten days later, the State Department approved a long-pending application by the Virginia-based private military company, Military Professional Resources, Inc. (MPRI) for a license to do an assessment of Equatorial Guinea’s requirements for a coast guard capable of defending its suddenly oil-rich territorial waters. When completed, MPRI expects to obtain a second license to implement the assessment’s recommendations in building and training a coast guard.

Both actions confirm a major change in US policy toward the former pariah – from indifference and isolation to one of engagement, however tentative. “We want to engage with (President Teodoro) Obiang, and we think he also wants to go forward with us,” says one official, noting that 1998 reforms introduced by his government made Equatorial Guinea much more attractive to US investment.

Still, many observers, especially human-rights groups, are nervous about Washington’s embrace, and particularly the forms which it has taken so far. As in Saudi Arabia, military-ruled Nigeria, and other abusive oil-producing states, they say, a bad human rights situation is being ignored in the interests of ensuring access to oil.

“The Clinton administration appears to be ignoring its own human rights reporting on Equatorial Guinea and is putting profit before principle,” according to Adotei Akwei, an African researcher at the US section of Amnesty International.

OPIC, for example, is barred by law from supporting projects in countries which systematically violate internationally recognised worker rights unless they are “taking steps to adopt and implement” them.

In its 1999 human rights report on Equatorial Guinea, the State Department noted that, the “government continued to restrict labour rights; no labour unions exist, and strikes are prohibited. The abuse of workers’ rights,” according to the report, “is a particular problem in the oil industry.”

But State Department officials insist that the government has improved its performance in this regard. “An NGO (non- governmental organisation) or two were permitted to enter the country, and it has allowed foreign businesses to use ILO (International Labour Organisation) standards with its own workers,” says one official.

Moreover, the government itself approached Washington about obtaining technical assistance to improve worker rights, according to the same official, who adds that the OPIC package will feature co-operation between US agencies, the ILO, and Malabo that can serve as “an example of what can be done” on labour rights.

Bolstering it is a “written communication from (Obiang) himself,” she insists. “We can’t accomplish anything by doing nothing, and this could accomplish a lot.”

General human-rights conditions, while not as bad as the brutal days of the Macias regime, remain dismal, according to both the State Department and independent monitors. Summary executions, torture, beatings and extortion of prisoners, and other abuses by the security forces continue to be reported by international human rights groups. Membership in opposition political parties or possession of critical foreign newspaper articles is punishable with imprisonment, according to a recent Amnesty report.

More worrisome to human-rights activists here is the MPRI license to assess the country’s requirement’s for a coast guard. MPRI, which is run by retired Pentagon officers, originally asked for a license to assess all of Malabo’s armed-forces needs. That request was vetoed by the State Department’s human rights bureau which later went along with the narrower proposal after receiving assurances from MPRI’s chief, ret. Gen Harry Soyster, that the assessment would include a human-rights component.

The firm will send a delegation headed by a retired US Coast Guard admiral to Equatorial Guinea next month for a six-week assignment, after which it will make its assessment and request a new license to help equip and train coast guard forces, according to Soyster, a former director of the Pentagon’s Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA).

The Pentagon itself could not do so, because it is barred from providing any support to foreign armed forces with abusive human rights records. But the State Department’s approval of the licence, required by law for the export of military equipment or training, clearly signals official US interest.

“It’s hard to say that a country can’t have a coast guard,” says Soyster, who has met with Obiang four times since an exploratory trip to Malabo more than two years ago. “The president hopes this programme will improve human rights.”

MPRI, which, at the Pentagon’s urging, has been deeply involved in Croatia and Bosnia, also has been asked by the Pentagon to develop a training programme for the Nigerian military under the new civilian government of President Olusegun Obasanjo.