STP - 11 Billion Barrels

This is the same article that has been posted before. I just like seeing it posted on different sites. This is from "The Standard - China's Business Newspaper". The article is about tourism but also mentions 11 billion barrels of oil - that can't hurt.

ND9

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/weekend_news_detail.asp?pp_cat=36&art_id=46370&sid=13912785&am...
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Tiny island of ecotourism

Saturday, June 09, 2007

Business is flocking to West Africa in forms friendly to its raw wilderness rich in wildlife, writes Barry Hatton
Flying into the tiny island of Principe off Africa's west coast brings a sense of traveling back in time.

Seen from over the Atlantic, the dense tropical jungle coats the volcanic terrain down to a turquoise sea and golden beaches reachable only by boat. It looks like a prehistoric land that time forgot.

Principe is one of the poorest spots on earth in dollar terms. But in terms of virgin tropical landscapes it is one of the wealthiest, says Rombout Swanborn, a Dutch businessman and conservationist.

Swanborn recently purchased two hotels on Principe and, backed by local authorities, aims to plug this island of about 6,000 people into the ecotourism boom now spreading across West Africa.

Ecotourism took off in eastern Africa in the early 1990s. Underdeveloped countries such as Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya discovered they had what vacationers from developed countries sought - raw wilderness rich in animal life.

Now the business is gaining traction in the western part of the African continent, too.

Ecotourism is flourishing in Gabon and Ghana. Angola and Nigeria are also signing up. Sao Tome and Principe, a twin-island nation in the Gulf of Guinea, aims to become the latest.

"The people here are sitting on a pot of gold," said Swanborn, who also operates four ecotourism developments in Gabon.

The Madrid, Spain-based World Tourism Organization in Octo
ber described Africa as the industry's "star performer." Growth in visitors is predicted to be around 10 percent this year, more than double the world average.

"One can safely say that the growth we observe in Africa ... is mainly based on ecotourism growth," Eugenio Yuris, head of the organization's sustainable tourism section, said.

The United Nations and international conservation bodies such as the World Wildlife Fund are backing the ecotourism trend. They view the development of sustainable tourism as a way of wedding local needs and care for the environment.

There are potential pitfalls, though.

Neel Inamdar, a senior adviser at Washington, DC-based Conservation International, a nonprofit organization, points out that Kenya has fought hard to recover from the damage wrought by high-volume, low-cost ecotourism.

"You need a strong regulatory environment, with bodies that will stand up to the industry," Inamdar said.

Principe island, just north of the equator, fits the bill of a tropical paradise.

Just a few hundred people live in its seaside capital, Santo Antonio. The rest are scattered across small communities of clapboard houses and tumbledown former plantation buildings where they scrape a living farming and fishing.

The jungle spills down to beaches where you can spend an entire day and the only footprints in the sand are your own.

The thick Atlantic rainforest is sprinkled with colorful birds, including rare species, and waterfalls. In certain seasons, sea turtles lay eggs on the beaches and whales come within view of land.

Despite its charms, this country is not all that it could be as a vacation destination. There are few hotels of international standard.

But tourism development is gathering pace.

Portugal's Pestana Group, which runs a resort on Sao Tome island, is building a development in the capital, also called Sao Tome, that includes a five-star hotel, a casino and villas.

Arlecio Costa, local director of the Falcon Group, is developing a huge project on the northern tip of Sao Tome island called Lago Azul with South African investors.

The US$380 million (HK$2.96 billion) development, still at the planning stage but scheduled to open in five years, includes a quay for cruise liners, an 18-hole golf course, a conference center and a hotel with a health spa.

"It looks like a dream," Costa said.

The project will leave a large footprint, but Costa insists its biggest selling point is the area's natural beauty, especially the nearby Obo National Park whose conservation activities are supported by the United Nations.

Sao Tome and Principe was a largely overlooked country until it found major oil reserves, estimated at 11 billion barrels, in its offshore waters a few years ago. That discovery brought foreign governments and international oil companies knocking at its door.

Costa, though, reckons tourism is the way forward.

"The oil will run out one day," he said. "Tourism can be forever, if you take care of it."

ASSOCIATED PRESS

U.S. Navy Plans Six-Month West African Training Mission
“Floating schoolhouse” to deploy training, medical teams in Gulf of Guinea

07 June 2007

U.S. Navy Plans Six-Month West African Training Mission
“Floating schoolhouse” to deploy training, medical teams in Gulf of Guinea

By Vince Crawley
USINFO Staff Writer



Washington -- The U.S. Navy plans this autumn to begin a half-year patrol of West Africa as a follow-up to a regional conference in November 2006, in which Gulf of Guinea nations called for greater maritime security cooperation.

Under the new plan, a U.S. ship will act as a floating headquarters and training base. It will cruise the region for five or six months, conducting numerous port visits, deploying training teams and allowing international visitors on board, said Admiral Harry Ulrich, chief of U.S. naval forces for Europe and Africa.

The ship will carry between 200 and 300 personnel – exact numbers will change over time as experts and specialized teams come and go, Ulrich told reporters May 31 after describing the plan to West African diplomats and military officers in Washington.

The ship’s personnel will focus mainly on training and working closely with Gulf of Guinea nations. Ulrich said he actively is seeking participation from European nations with an interest in West Africa as well as nongovernmental organizations. The idea is to create a “floating schoolhouse” in which multinational training teams can train in key activities such as port and oil-platform security, search-and-rescue missions and medical and humanitarian assistance.

“I think there are plenty of opportunities for nations to participate,” Ulrich said.

The ship has not yet been formally identified, and the six-month mission is part of a new concept that the Navy calls Global Fleet Station. The concept allows the Navy to conduct regionwide training and partnership missions involving hundreds of Americans and thousands of international personnel while minimizing the requirements for shore-based, host-nation facilities.

The first Global Fleet Station mission began in late April when the high-speed vessel [HSV] Swift embarked on a summer-long tour to the Caribbean and Central America, with teams scheduled to visit Belize, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua and Panama, according to a U.S. Navy announcement.

For the West African mission, Ulrich said the ship is expected to sail a circuit of Gulf of Guinea nations, including: Senegal, Liberia, Ghana, Sao Tome and Principe, Cameroon, Gabon and Angola. Ulrich said that Nigeria also has expressed interest but has just completed an election and is forming a new government, so discussions on Nigerian involvement likely will take place later this summer.

Ulrich said the Gulf of Guinea naval mission is “closely aligned” with the creation of the new U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) announced by President Bush in February to coordinate U.S. military and government interests across Africa. Unlike a traditional military headquarters, AFRICOM is expected to focus on humanitarian, medical and training missions to assist African nations in creating the conditions for political, social and economic stability. (See related article.)

The Navy has been increasing its presence in West Africa for several years, Ulrich said, but added that the new Gulf of Guinea initiative is “in the spirit of AFRICOM.”

The initiative is a follow-up to a November 2006 conference in Benin, co-sponsored by the United States, in which 11 Gulf of Guinea nations agreed to work together to address maritime security issues. (See related article.)

The Gulf of Guinea accounts for almost 15 percent of the U.S. crude oil supply and is rich in other natural resources. But the region also faces numerous challenges, including illegal fishing, piracy, oil theft, criminal activity and illegal trafficking. A priority for U.S. policy includes helping to foster economic and political stability, and good governance as ways to undermine factors that contribute to terrorism and other regional threats.

The Navy’s training teams in West Africa will focus on four main themes:

• Training maritime professionals, such as navy and coast guard crews;

• Improving maritime infrastructure, such as protecting harbors, ships and oil platforms;

• Enhancing maritime “domain awareness,” which concerns being able to monitor and identify illegal or hostile sea traffic; and

• Strengthening maritime interdiction capability, such as being able to stop illegal traffic, as well as being able to conduct search-and-rescue operations or to to help mariners in distress.

Retired Ambassador Peter Chaveas, director the African Center for Strategic Studies in Washington, a Defense Department initiative, said West African officials appear to support the idea of increased U.S. Navy training emphasis. But African nations also are concerned that the concept will not be long-lasting.

“Africans show a great deal of skepticism. We have to … make the case that we’re with them for the long term,” he said.

Ulrich said he intends to follow up the six-month Gulf of Guinea mission with a year-round presence.

(USINFO is produced by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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Howard Jeter writes 6/7/07 article below

Posted on Thu, Jun. 07, 2007
Darfur needs multilateral aidThe U.S. has worked to halt the genocide in the Sudanese region. Other countries have not.

Howard F. Jeter
is president and CEO of the Leon H. Sullivan Foundation

Since President Bush announced a new round of sanctions against Sudan, the administration has been bombarded with criticism. The standard view has been that the sanctions are too little, too late against a government accused of slaughtering its own people. However, this criticism points fingers in the wrong direction.

The U.N. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide calls for governments and other actors committing genocide to be punished. In pursuit of that obligation, the United Nations has approved several measures to sanction Sudan for its involvement in genocide in Darfur, but to date, the United States appears to be the only country actually implementing sanctions.

Both the Bush and Clinton administrations, supported by Congress, have tried to secure multilateral cooperation in reining in the Sudanese government and its Janjaweed militia surrogates in its massive, unconscionable abuse of its own people, including genocide, wanton rape, the burning of villages, and the destruction of crops. To a large extent, this effort has failed. U.N. Security Council Resolution 1706, which calls for a hybrid United Nations/African Union protection force in Darfur, has not been honored because of the international community's lack of resolve.

China and Russia, members of the Security Council, consistently have refused to agree to strong condemnatory language against Sudan in the form of arms embargoes and other needed sanctions. Both countries do significant business with Sudan, China in the development and purchase of large quantities of oil and Russia in the sale of arms and munitions.

China and Russia are not the only culprits. Japan actually is Sudan's largest current trading partner, with trade totaling more than $3 billion last year, up nearly 64 percent from the previous year during a period in which the world accused Sudan of continued complicity in genocide. In 2005, French exports to Sudan topped $87 million; German exports exceeded $34 million, and British exports were more than $32 million. Canada had more than $63 million in exports to Sudan last year, down less than 5 percent from its 2005 total.

Despite the fact that Sudan is not a former colony or dependency of the United States, our government has devoted substantial resources to addressing the successive crises there - from the north-south civil war and enslavement of southerners to the genocide in Darfur.

Washington also has spent hundreds of millions of dollars in support of peacekeeping operations in southern Sudan and in Darfur. Since the Darfur crisis began in 2003, the U.S. government has allocated more than $2 billion for humanitarian relief and peacekeeping operations by the African Union. It has been estimated that U.S. humanitarian aid at various times constituted two-thirds or more of all humanitarian assistance provided to Darfur.

The sanctions against Sudan announced by Bush will not bring the Khartoum regime to its knees: There is a limit to what unilateral sanctions can achieve. Sanctions on Sudan are supposed to be multilateral, not the responsibility of one country.

The international community must join in this effort to effectively isolate Sudan and make the Sudanese government realize it can no longer carry out its genocidal policies with near impunity. It will never learn this lesson as long as the United States is standing alone in effectively confronting a rogue government that callously violates even the most basic right of its own people: the right to life.

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The Leon H. Sullivan Foundation (www.thesullivanfoundation.org) is hosting "What the International Community is Doing for Darfur" at 4 p.m. tomorrow at the International House of Philadelphia, 3701 Chestnut St.

Ruby1100 - that's straight out of Addax presentation - from last week.

ND9

Export/Import Bank = Howard Jeter, Director, ERHC Energy

Howard F. Jeter, Director

Howard F. Jeter has served as a director since April 2005. Ambassador Jeter retired with the rank of Career Minister from the State Department in 2003 after a 27-year career in the Foreign Service. He is the immediate past US Ambassador to Nigeria. He also served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, State Department Director for West Africa, President Clinton's Special Envoy for Liberia, and Ambassador to Botswana. Ambassador Jeter was Deputy Chief of Mission and later Charge d'Affaires in Lesotho and Namibia. He also had multi-year assignments in Tanzania and Mozambique. He earned his Bachelor of Arts Degree, with Honors, from Morehouse College and Masters Degrees in International Relations, Comparative Politics, and African Studies from Columbia University and UCLA. He is currently the Executive Vice President of GoodWorks International, an international consulting and business advisory group, Chairman of the Advisory Committee on Africa, US Export - Import Bank and a board member of Africare and Africa Action.

Relevant Individuals (case against Jefferson)

15. Export-import Bank of tbe United States ("Ex-Im Bank"): The Ex-Im Bank, with its headquarters in Washington, D.C., was the official export credit agency of the United States and was established by Congress as an agency of the United States "to aid in financing and to facilitate exports and imports and the exchange of commodities and services between the United States. . . and any foreign country or the agencics or nationals thereof." The Ex-Im Bank typically provided loan guarantees and other means of financing designed to support United States exports to foreign countries.

The Case Against Jefferson
06.07.2007


In The United States District Cour'
For The Eastern District of Virginia
Alexandria Division

United States Of America
v.
Williams J. Jefferson,
Defendant

CRIMINAL NO. 1:07CR209
• Count 1: 18 V.S.C. & 371 (Conspiracy to Solicit Bribes by a Public Official, Deprive Citizens of Honest Services by Wire Fraud, and Violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act)
• Count 2: 18 V.S.C. & 371 (Conspiracy to Solicit Bribes by a Public Official and Deprive Citizens of Honest Services by Wire Fraud)
• Counts 3-4: 18 V.S.C. & 201(b)(2)(A) (Solicitation of Bribes by a Public Official)
• Counts 5-10: 18 V.S.C. && 1343 and 1346 (Scheme to Deprive Citizens of Honest Services by Wire Fraud)
• Count 11: IS V.S.C. & 78dd-2(a) (Foreign Corrupt Practices Act)
• Counts 12-14: 18 V.S.C. & 1957 (Money Laundering)
• Count 15: 18 V.S.c. & 1512(c)(I) (Obstruction of Justice)
• Count 16: 18 V.S.C. & 1962(c) (Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organization, Pattern of Racketeering Activity (RICO»
Forfeiture Allegations: 18 V.S.C. && 981, 982, and 1963; 28 V.S.C. & 2461

Indictment
June 2007 Term - At Alexandria
The Grand Jury Charges That:

General Allegations
At all times relevant to this Indictment:
Since 1991, WILLIAM J. JEFFERSON, the defendant, was a Member of the United States House of Representatives, representing the 2" Congressional District in the State of Louisiana. As such, he was a public official within the meaning of Title 18, United States Code, & 201(a)(I).
2. Defendant JEFFERSON maintained several offices for the purpose of conducting his official congressional duties, including offices in Washington, D.C., and New Orleans, Louisiana. Defendant JEFFERSON supervised and directed the activities of congressional staff membcrs who worked in those offices and who, at the direction of Defendant JEFFERSON, routinely contacted government agencies on behalf of constituents.
3. At various times relevant to this Indictment, Defendant JEFFERSON was a Member of the Committee on Ways and Means, Subcommittee on Trade; Member ofthe Committee on the Budget; Co-Chair of the Africa Trade and Investment Caucus; and Co-Chair of the Congressional Caucus on Nigeria.
4. Defendant JEFFERSON received a Juris Doctor degree from Harvard University in Junc 1972 as well as a Master of Laws Degree in Taxation from the Georgetown University Law Center in February 1996. In addition, Defendant JEFFERSON was a citizen of the United States, and as such, Defendant JEFFERSON was a "domestic concern" within the meaning of the Foreign Conupt Practices Act of 1977 ("FCPA"), 15 U.S.C. & 78dd-2(h)(1)(A).
The Congress of the United States and Responsibilities of Members of the United States House of Renresentatives
5. The Congress of the United States, comprised of a Senate and House of Representatives, was established by Article I of the United States Constitution. Since that time, Members of Congress have played an important role in the system of government in the United States by proposing and passing laws, taking actions to protect citizens, and providing services and assistance to their constituents.
6. At the beginning of a new Congress, each Member was required to take the following oath of office: I, (Member's Name), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and alJegiance to the same; that I take this obligation 1Teely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfulJy discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.
7. In addition to the above-referenced oath, the Rules of the United States House of Representatives set forth certain rules and codes of conduct that:
a. prohibited a Member of the House from receiving outside acompensation as a result of the improper exercise of influence from the Member's position in Congress;
b. prohibited a Member of the House from earning outside income in a calendar year that exceeded 15% of a certain basic pay rate;
c. required that a Member of the House file Annual Financial Disclosure Statements with the Clerk of the House; 8.
d. required that a Member of the House seek an exemption from the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to receive more than $250 worth of gifts annually, and, in any event, only from a person the Member designated as a personal friend;
e. prohibited trips by a Member of the House paid for by private sources unless the trip was taken in connection with the Member's duties as an officeholder; and
f. required that a Member of the House and the Member's staff sign and file a Travel Disclosure Form ("Travel Form") with the Clerk of the House within 30 days after any trip paid for by private sources, with the Travel Form containing detailed information about the purpose, cost, and sponsor of the trip, and an affirmation that the travel was in connection with the Member's duties as an officeholder and would not create the appearance that the Member was using public office for private gain.
Consistent with his oath of office and the duties of the office he held, Defendant JEFFERSON owed the citizens of the United States and the United States House of Representatives a duty to perform the responsibilities of his office free from deceit, fraud, concealment, bias, conflict of interest, self-enrichment, and self-dealing.

Relevant Individuals
9. Vernon L. Jackson ("Jackson"): Since in or about January 1998, Jackson was the president, chief executive officer, and chairman of the board ofiGate, Incorporated, a Louisville, Kentucky telecommunications firm.
10.Brett M. Pfeffer ("Pfeffer"): In 2004 and 2005, Pfeffer was employed as the president of an investment firm located in Mclean, Virginia. In the mid-1990's, Pfeffer served on the congressional staff of Defendant JEFFERSON in both his New Orleans and Washington, D.C.,.offices. In addition, Pfeffer was a citizen of the United States, and as such, was a "domestic concern" within the meaning of the FCP A, 15 U.S.C. 9 78dd-2(h)(1 )(A).
11. Nigerian Official A: In 2004 and 2005, Nigerian Official A was a high-ranking official in the executive branch of the Government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and acted in an official capacity for and on behalf of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and as such, was a "foreign official" within the meaning of the FCPA, IS U.S.C. ~ .78dd-2(h)(2)(A). During this same time period, a spouse of Nigerian Official A ("Nigerian Official A's Spousc"), who lived in Potomac, Maryland, was a United States citizen, and as such, was a "domestic concern" within the meaning of the FCPA, 15 U.S.C. 78dd-2(h)(I)(A).
12. Cooperating Witness ("CW"): In or about March 2005, a McLean, Virginia, businessperson reported a suspected fraud involving iGate, Jackson, and Defendant JEFFERSON to the Federal Bureau of Investigation ("FBf'). After contacting the FBI, that businessperson becamc a cooperating witness for the government.
13. Jefferson Familv Members: Certain relatives of Defendant JEFFERSON, by birth or by marriage, are referred to in this Indictment as "Family Members 1-5," respectively.
14. Congressional Staff Members: Individuals employed by the Office of Congressman WILLIAM J. JEFFERSON, are referred to in this Indictment as "congressional staffmembers." Relev3_nt Uuited States Government Agencies
15. Export-import Bank of tbe United States ("Ex-Im Bank"): The Ex-Im Bank, with its headquarters in Washington, D.C., was the official export credit agency of the United States and was established by Congress as an agency of the United States "to aid in financing and to facilitate exports and imports and the exchange of commodities and services between the United States. . . and any foreign country or the agencics or nationals thereof." The Ex-Im Bank typically provided loan guarantees and other means of financing designed to support United States exports to foreign countries.
16. United States Trade and Development Agency ("USTDA "): The USTDA, with its headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, within the Eastern District of Virginia, was established by Congress as an agency of the United States "to promote United States private sector participation in development projects in developing and middle-income countries, with special emphasis on economic sectors with significant United States export potential, such as energy, transportation, telecommunications, and environment." The USTDA pursued this goal by funding vatious fonns of technical assistance, investment analysis, training, orientation visits, and business workshops. Jefferson Family-Controlled Companies Defendant JEFFERSON participated in controlling and directing the actions of each of the following companies:
17. The ANJ Grono. L.L.C. ("ANJ"): ANJ was a limited liability company organized under the laws of the State of Louisiana on or about January 19, 2001. Records on tile with the Louisiana Secretary of State listed Family Member 1 as an organizer, manager, and member of ANJ. Five other Jefferson family members were also listed as members of ANJ, and Defendant JEFFERSON's accountant and campaign treasurer was listed as the registered agent for ANJ.
18. B.E.P. Consulting Services. LLC ("BEP"): BEP was a limited liability company organized under the laws of the State of Louisiana on or about October 24, 2000. Records on file with the Louisiana Secretary of State listed Family Member 2 as a registered agent, member, and president of BEP.
19. Global Energy & Environmental Services LLC ("Global"): Global was a limited liability company organized under the laws of the State of Delaware on or about March 21,2003, and, as such. was a "domestic concern" and Defendant JEFFERSON was an "agent of such domestic concern" within the meaning of the FCP A, 15 U.S.C. && 78dd-2(a) and 18dd 2(h)(1)(B). Company records listed five Jefferson faruily members as members of Global.
20. Intemational Petroleum LLC ("International Petroleum"): International Petroleum was a limited liability company organized under the laws of the State of Louisiana on or about May 24, 2002. Records on file with the Louisiana Secretary of State listed the daughter of a congressional staff member as the manager, organizer, and registered agent of International Petroleum.
21. Jefferson Interests. Inc. ("Jefferson Interests"): Jefferson Interests was incorporated under the laws of the State of Louisiana on or about January 3, 1983, and whose authority to do business in Louisiana was revoked on or about November 19, 1990. Records on file with the Louisiana Secretary of State listed Defendant JEFFERSON as the president, Faruily Member 2 as the secretary and treasurer, and another Jefferson family member as the vicepresident of the corporation.
22. Multi-Media Broad Band Senrices.. Inc. ("Multi-Media"): Multi-Media was incorporated under the laws of the State of Delaware on or about July 20,2005, by Defendant JEFFERSON. Defendant JEFFERSON designated Faruily Member 5 as the chief executive officer of Multi-Media. As of August 3, 2005, ANJ held a 40% ownership interest in Multi-Media.
23. Providence International I'droleum Company. LLC ("PIPCO"): PIPCO was a limited liability company organized under the laws of the State of Louisiana on or about January 29, 2002. Records on file with the Louisiana Secretary of State listed a congressional staff member as the organizer and manager of PIPCO. Those records also listed Defendant JEFFERSON's accountant and campaign treasurer as the registered agent of PIP CO.
24. Providence Lake. L.L.C. ("Providence Lake"): Providence Lake was a limited liability company formed on August 25, 2000, and organized under the laws of the State of Louisiana on or about October 5, 2000, and it also did business as "Providence International Company" and "Providence International, LLC." Records on file with the Louisiana Secretary of State listed a congressional stafTmernber as the organizer and manager of Providence Lake.
Those records also listed Defendant JEFFERSON's accountant and campaign treasurer as thc registered agent of Providence Lake.

Companies That Defendant JEFFERSON solicited for Bribes
25. iGate. Incorporated ("iGate"): iGate was incorporated undcr the laws of the State of Indiana in or about January 1998 and headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky. As such, iGate was a "domestic concern" and Defendant JEFFERSON was an "agent of such domestic concern" within the meaning of the FCPA., 15 V.S.C. 99 78dd-2(a) and 78dd-2(h)(I)(B). Vernon L. Jackson was tbe president, chief executive officer, and cbairman of the board of iGate. iGate developed and marketed "Triple Play" technology, which enabled audio, video, and data to be transmi tied over copper wire.
26. W2-ffiBS. Limited ("W2-IBBS”): W2-IBBS was a company organized under the laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. W2IBBS was controlled by CW.
27. International Broad Band Services. LLC (“IBBS”): IBBS was a company that was in the process of being registered under the laws of the Republic of Ghana. IBBS was controlled by CW.
28. Nigerian Company A: Nigerian Company A was a telecommunications company with its corporate offices located in Abuja, Nigeria. Nigerian Businessperson A was involved in conducting its operations.
29. Companv A: Company A was a business that provided satellite-based radio and data broadcasting services to subscribers in numerous regions of the world. Company A was headquartered in Washington, D.C. Company A's chairman and chief executive officer was a person hereinafter referred to as Businessperson A.
30. Company 8: Company B was a South African business that, among other things, sought certain drilling rights to deep water oil reserves located in the territorial waters off the coast of the Republic of Sao Tome and Principe in the Gulf of Guinea. Company B was represented by a person hereinafter referred to as Businessperson BC. A person hereinafter referred to as Lobbyist A was involved with these deep water oil reserves.
31. Comnanv C: Company C was incorporated under the laws of the State of Delaware that manufactured and sold systems that convenedvarious traditional waste products into electricity for commercial and residential use. Company C was represented by Businessperson BC.
32. Company D: Company D was incorporated under the laws of the State of Louisiana whose business was to provide full service design, engineering, and construction services in nwnerous regions of the world, including Africa. A person hereinafter referred to as Businessperson DEF was vice-president of Company D and participated in decisions concerning the direction and control of Company D.
33. Company E: Company E was a corporation organized under the laws of the State of Louisiana whose business was to provide services related to the design and construction of sugar factories. Businessperson DEF participated in decisions concerning the direction and control of Company E.
34. Company F: Company F was a corporation organized under the laws of the State of Louisiana whose business was, in part, to develop oil and natural gas projects internationally. Businessperson DEF participated in directing and controlling Company F.
35. Company G: Company G was a limited liability company organized under the laws of the State of Louisiana whose business objectives included the development of various projects in Nigeria such as marginal oil fields and a fertilizer plant. A person hereinafter referred to as Businessperson G was a member of Company G and participated in directing and controlling Company G. Lobbyist A also represented Company G in connection with its efforts to gain the official assistance of Defendant JEFFERSON. Other Nigerian Businesses
36. Nigerian Comnany B: Nigerian Company B was an Internet service provider with its headquarters in Abuja, Nigeria. Nigerian Businessperson B was the founder and chief executive officer ofNigeria,," Company B.
37. Nigeria Telecommunications. Ltd. ("NlTEL"): NlTEL was a governmentcontrolled Nigerian company headquartered in Nigeria., and was the main telecommunications service provider in Nigeria.
38. Nigerian Joint Venture: From in or about August 2004 through August 2005, Defendant JEFFERSON, CW, Nigerian Businessperson B, and others negotiated a joint venture agreement between W2-IBBS and Nigerian Company B to pursue a telecommunications business in Nigeria using iGate technology and equipment The proposed joint venture ("Nigerian Joint Venture") contemplated a partnership between W2-IBBS and Nigerian Company B wherein costs and profits would be divided between them with W2-IBBS maintaining a controlling interest in the Nigerian Joint Venture.

COUNT 1
Conspiracy to Solicit Bribes by a Public Official, Deprive Citizens of Honest Services by Wire Fraud, and Violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act THE GRAND JURY FURTHER CHARGES THAT:
39. Paragraphs I through 38 of this Indicttnent are re-alleged as if fully set forth herein.

THE CONSPIRACY AND ITS Objects
40. Beginning in or about January 2001 through in or about August 2005, within the Eastern District of Virginia and elsewhere, the defendant, WILLIAM J. JEFFERSON, did knowingly combine, conspire, confederate, and agree, together with Veroon L. Jackson, Brett M. Pfeffer, and others known and unknown to the grand jury, to commit the following offel1S1:S against the United States:
a. to, directly and indirectly, corruptly demand, seek, receive, accept, and agree to receive and accept anything of value personally and for any other person and entity, in return for being influenced in the perfonnance of any official act, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 201(b)(2)(A);
b. to devise a scheme and artifice to deftaud and deprive the citizens of the United States and the United States House of Representatives of their right to the honest services of Defendant JEFFERSON, performed free from deceit, ftaud, concealment, bias, conflict of interest, self-enrichment, and self-dealing, and to use wire communications in interstate and foreign commerce to further the scheme to deftaud, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 1343 and 1346; and
c. to willfully use the mails and any means and instrumentalities of interstate commerce corruptly in furtherance of an offer, payment, promise to pay, and authorization of the payment of any money, and offer, gift, promise to give, and authorization of the giving of anything of value to any foreign officials for purposes of: (i) influencing acts and decisions of such foreign officials in their official capacities; (ii) inducing such foreign officials to do and omit to do acts in violation of the lawful duty of such officials; (iii) securing any improper advantage; and (iv) inducing such foreign officials to use their influence with a foreign government and instrumentality thereof to affect and influence any act and decision of such government and instrumentality, in order to assist Defendant JEFFERSON and others in obtaining and retaining business for and with, and directing business to, any person, in violation of Title 15, United States Code, Section 78dd-2(a).
NATURE AND PURPOSE OF
THE CONSPIRACY
The nature and purpose of the conspiracy included the following:
41. To provide for the unjust enrichment of Defendant JEFFERSON and his family members by corruptly seeking, soliciting, and directing that things of value be paid to him and his family members in rcturn for Defendant JEFFERSON's performance of official acts.
42. To use the Office of Congressman WILLIAM J. JEFFERSON, including the congressional staff members employed therein, to perform official acts to advance the interests of the businesses and persons who had agreed to pay things of value to Defendant JEFFERSON and his family members.
43.To conceal the illegal nature of Defendant JEFFERSON's solicitations for, and receipt of, various things of the value through the preparations of misleading written agreements, the use of nominee companies, and the omission of material facts concerning the financial benefits that were sought on behalf of, and received by, Defendant JEFFERSON and his family members, all to ensure the continued existence and success of the conspiracy.
44. To offer, promise, and make bribe payments to foreign officials of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, including Nigerian Official A, in order to advance the business interests of the Nigerian Joint Venture, its members and stockholders, and others who had agreed to pay Defendant JEFFERSON and his family things of value in return for his official acts.

MANNER AND MEANS OF
THE CONSPIRACY
Among the manner and means by which Defendant JEFFERSON and his co-conspirators would and did carry out the conspiracy were the following:
45. As a Member of the United States House of Representatives and certain of its committees and caucuses, Defendant JEFFERSON discussed providing official assistance to constituent companies, including iGate and CW's companies, and businesspersons, including Vernon Jackson and CW, seeking to obtain and conduct business in west African nations, including Nigeria, Ghana, and Cameroon.
46. After initially discussing such business endeavors with these businesspersons, Defendant JEFFERSON sought things of value for himself and his family mcmbers in return for providing official assistance to promote those business endeavors. The things of value Defendant JEFFERSON sought in return for providing his official assistance included monthly fees or retainers, consulting fees, percentage shares of revenue and profit, flat fees per item sold, and stock ownership in thc companies seeking his official assistance.
47. Defendant JEFFERSON sought to and did conceal his and his family members' expected or actual receipt of things of value by directing congressional staff members, family members, and others to form nominee companies that entered into business agreements to receive the things of value sought by Defendant JEFFERSON while not referencing him or disclosing his involvement in obtaining the agreements. The nominee companies included ANJ, Global, and Multi-Media.
48. While seeking things of value, Defendant JEFFERSON typically required that the agreements with the nominee companies be reduced to writing to make them appear to be lawful agreements for professional and legitimate services when, in fact, the companies and businesspersons were giving things of value to Defendant JEFFERSON and his designees in return for official acts to be performed by Defendant JEFFERSON.
49. In return for things of value, Defendant JEFFERSON agreed to perform and did perform a pattern of official acts to promote and advance the business interests of these companies and businesspersons in West Afiica and elsewhere. These official acts included:
a. conducting official travel to foreign countries and meeting with foreign government officials for the purpose of influencing those officials;
b. using his congressional staff members to create trip itineraries, accompany Defendant JEFFERSON on travel, and otherwise provide official assistance;
c. contacting both United States and foreign embassies to schedule meetings with foreign government officials, obtaining entry and exit visas for travelers, and otherwise assisting with the official travel;
d. sending official cOITeSpondence on congressional letterhead to foreign government officials; and
e. scheduling and participating in meetings with officials of United States agencies to secure potential financing for the business ventures sought by the companies and businesspersons.
50. Defendant JEFFERSON failed to disclose his and his family's financial interests in these business ventures by omitting this material information from travel and financial disclosure forms required to be filed by the Rules of the United States House of Representatives and, in some cases, by simply failing to make any of the required filings.
51. Defendant JEFFERSON failed to disclose to United States and foreign government officials his and his family's financial interests in the business ventures he was officially promoting in order to give the false impression that Defendant JEFFERSON was merely acting as an impartial public servant promoting United States business interests abroad.
52. Defendant JEFFERSON, Nigerian Businessperson B, and others agreed that bribes would be paid, as needed, to various Nigerian government officials if deemed necessary to the success of the Nigerian Joint Venture. Defendant JEFFERSON was responsible for negotiating, offering, and delivering the payment of bribes to Nigerian Official A to induce Nigerian Official A to use his position to assist in securing approvals necessary to the success of the Nigerian Joint Venture. Nigerian Businessperson B was responsible for the payment of bribes to lower ranking Nigerian government officials to ensure the success of the Nigerian Joint Venture.
• See Full Report on www.thisdayonline.com

OYERT Acr.S
In furtherance of the conspiracy, and to effect the objects thereof, the following overt acts were committed within the Eastern Dislrict of Virginia and elsewhere:
Defendant JEFFERSON Soul"ht Bn"bes from iGate for ANJ
53. In or about January 2001, after initially assisting iGate, Defendant JEFFERSON informed Jackson that Defendant JEFFERSON would not continue to use his official position as
a United States Congressman to promote iGate's business unless Jackson agreed to pay ANJ (a
Jefferson family-controlled company).
54.
In or about January 2001, Defendant JEFFERSON presented a "Professional
Services Agreement" to Jackson that called for payments from iGate to ANJ, including monthly
payments of$7,5oo.oo; 5% ofiGate's gross sales and certain capital raised; and options for up to
one million shares of iGate stock over a five-year period.
55.
On or about January 15,2001, Jackson signed the Professional Services
Agreement on behalf of iGate and Family Member I signed on behalf of ANJ.
56.
On or about January 19,2001, Defendant JEFFERSON and Family Member I
caused the formation of ANJ under the laws of the State of Louisiana.
57.
On or about January 22, 2001, Jackson caused iGate to issue 100,000 shares of
iGate stock to ANJ.
58.
On or about February 15,2001, Jackson caused the first of several payments of
$7,500.00 to be made to ANJ.
59.
In or about June 2002, Defendant JEFFERSON introduced Jackson 10 a Member
of the United States House of Representatives, who was a prominent member of the
-17-

Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade, and Consumer Protection, for the purpose of
garnering that Member's support for iGatc's technology without disclosing Defendant
JEFFERSON's family's financial interest in iGatc's business.
60.
On or about October 22, 2002, as a result of the above-referenced meeting,
Defendant JEFFERSON caused the aforementioned Member to send to iGate on official
congressional letterhead and under that Member's signature praising iGatc's technology.
Defendant JEFFERSON Sou2ht Bribes from Ni2erian Comnanv A
61.
In or about July 2003, in Nigeria, Defendant JEFFERSON met executives of
Nigerian Company A, who were pursuing a telecommunications venture in Nigeria and
elsewhere in Africa, and advised them that iGate could provide the goods and services desired by
Nigerian Company A.
62.
On or about July 20, 2003, in London, England, Defendant JEFFERSON
introduced Jackson to Nigerian Company A executives, including Nigerian Businessperson A,
who preliminarily agreed to purchase iGate's products and services for Nigerian Company A's
use in Nigeria.
63.
On or about July 20, 2003, in London, England, without Jackson's knowledge,
Defendant JEFFERSON solicited from Nigerian Businessperson A a percentage of revenue and
stock, as well as fees estimated to be worth $1 million, to be paid to Defendant JEFFERSON, all
in return for Defendant JEFFERSON's official assistance with Nigerian and United Stales
government officials to further a telecommunications venture by Nigerian Company A and iGate
in Nigeria.

Defendant JEFFERSON Sougbt an Increase in Bribe Pavments from iGate for ANJ
64.
On or about July 24,2003, in Washington, D.C., Defendant JEFFERSON
presented Jackson witb an "Amendment to Professional Services Agreement," which required
iGate to pay ANJ 35% of any profits derived from iGate's business in Africa.
65.
On or about August 6, 2003, in New York, New York, Jackson, on behalf of
iGate, entered into a business agreement whereby Nigerian Company A agreed to pay iGate a
total of $44,934,400.00 contingent upon an iGate production schedule, which included a $6.5
million up-front payment to iGate by Nigerian Company A within five business days of entering
into tbe agreement.
66.
In or about August 2003, in Washington, D.C., Defendant JEFFERSON
introduced Jackson and Nigerian Company A executives to personnel oftbe Ex-1m Bank for tbe
purpose of obtaining financial support for iGate and Nigerian Company A's venture in Nigeria.
67.
On or about September 22, 2003, after iGate had received approximately $1.5
million pursuant to its business agreement witb Nigerian Company A, Defendant JEFFERSON
caused Family Member I to submit an invoice to Jackson seeking $240,000.00 "currendy due to
[ANJ] as compensation under its professional services agreement."
68.
On or about December 27, 2003, in anticipation of additional payments from
Nigerian Company A to iGate, Defendant JEFFERSON reminded Jackson in writing !bat iGate
owed money to ANJ, stating, "When tbe money comes in in a few days for the African project, I
trust tbat . . . iGate's debt to ANJ will be brought fully current. It now stands at $262,500.00."
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69.
On or aboul January 23,2004, one day after iGate had received approximately $5
million from Nigerian Company A, Jackson caused $200,000.00 to be wired from iGate's bank
account in New Albany, Indiana, to ANJ's bank accounl in New Orleans, Louisiana.
70.
On or aboul January 26, 2004, Jackson caused an additional $30,000.00 to be
wired from iGale's bank account in New Albany, Indiana, 10 ANJ's bank account in New
Orleans, Louisiana.
71.
On or about January 28, 2004, Defendanl JEFFERSON presented a memorandum
10 Jackson proposing thai iGate issue additional shares ofiGate slock: 10 ANJ, increasing ANJ's
ownership stake in iGate 10 15%.
72.
On or about February 2, 2004, Defendanl JEFFERSON caused a congressional
staff member 10 send an e-mail from Defendanl JEFFERSON's Washington, D.C., congressional
office to the United States Embassy in Abuja, Nigeria, seeking assistance in arranging meetings
for Defendanl JEFFERSON with high-ranking Nigerian government officials during Defendant
JEFFERSON's upcoming trip 10 Nigeria.
73.
On or about February 15, 2004, Defendant JEFFERSON, Jackson, a congressional
staff member, and others departed from Washington Dulles International Airport in Loudoun
County, Virginia, on an iGate co-sponsored trip 10 several west African nalions, including
Nigeria, to promole iGate and other business ventures 10 government officials of those nations.
74.
From on or about February 17, 2004, through on or about February 20,2004,
Defendanl JEFFERSON, in his capacity as a Member of the United Stales House of
Representatives, met with government officials in Nigeria and Cameroon and promoted iGale
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Gulf of Guinea Commission’s Ministerial Meeting without Fixed Date

Photo Angop

Angolan Premier (left) receives secretary of Gulf of Guinea Commission, Carlos Bragança Gomes

Luanda, 06/06 – The meeting of Foreign Affairs Ministers of the Gulf of Guinea Commission, scheduled to happen next June 21, in Luanda, might not be held due to delays in the preparation of documents for analysis.

This possibility was given by the commission’s executive secretary, Sao Tomean Carlos Bragança Gomes, at the end of an audience granted to him by the Angolan Prime Minister, Fernando da Piedade Dias dos Santos.

According to him, June 21 would be the ideal date for the meeting, due to the fact that, at this period, Luanda will host Foreign Affairs Ministers of the region’s member States, for the Sixth Conference of the Atlantic South Peace and Co-operation Zone, to happen on 18 and 19 of the same month.

The meeting, he said, would also discuss various essential documents of sustaining the organisation, such as the statutes, regulations and the action plan, which would have been submitted for the approval of Heads of State and Governments, at a summit to the summoned for the effect.

Thus, he informed that the audience with the Prime Minister served to inform him about the implementation state of the project of establishing the commission, which he considered as being at a good stage, resulting from the availability and assistance of Angola, in monetary values and infrastructures.

The Gulf of Guinea Commission was set up during the Summit of Heads of State and Governments of member states of this region, rich in hydrocarbons, held in October 2006, in Libreville, Gabon.

With headquarters in Luanda, it began functioning as from 11 April this year, a date in which the Angolan Government formally handed over the host agreement that will govern the relations between Angola and this regional organisation, focused on co-operation and prevention of conflicts in the oil sector.

Composed by Angola, Nigeria, Cameroon, Sao Tome and Principe, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Congo Brazzaville and DRC, the Gulf of Guinea Commission resulted from the need of promoting stability in this zone that is rich in natural resources, with highlight to oil.
http://www.angolapress-angop.ao/noticia-e.asp?ID=536563

Business ventures that Congressman Jefferson sought to promote included: telecommunications deals in Nigeria, Ghana, and elsewhere; oil concessions in Equatorial Guinea; satellite transmission contracts in Botswana, Equatorial Guinea, and the Republic of Congo; and development of different plants and facilities in Nigeria.

Rep. William Jefferson Indicted for Bribery, Money Laundering and Other Crimes

Jim Kouri, CPP
June 5, 2007
United States Congressman William J. Jefferson, Democrat from Louisiana, was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges including bribery and racketeering for allegedly using his office to corruptly solicit bribes and for paying bribes to a foreign official, Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher of the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg for the Eastern District of Virginia announced during a press conference.

The 16-count indictment, returned by a federal grand jury in Alexandria, VA, charges Jefferson with solicitation of bribes, honest services wire fraud, money laundering, obstruction of justice, violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, racketeering, and conspiracy.

The indictment alleges that from about August 2000 through in or about August 2005, Jefferson, while serving as an elected member of the U.S. House of Representatives, used his position and his office to corruptly seek, solicit and direct that things of value be paid to Jefferson and his family members in exchange for his performance of official acts to advance the interests of people and businesses who offered him the bribes.

The things of value allegedly sought and/or received by Jefferson on behalf of his business interests and relatives included hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of bribes in the form of payments from monthly fees or retainers, consulting fees, percentage shares of revenues and profits, flat fees for items sold, and stock ownership in the companies seeking his official assistance.

The official acts allegedly undertaken by Jefferson included leading official business delegations to Africa, corresponding with U.S. and foreign government officials, and utilizing congressional staff members to promote businesses and businesspersons. Business ventures that Congressman Jefferson sought to promote included: telecommunications deals in Nigeria, Ghana, and elsewhere; oil concessions in Equatorial Guinea; satellite transmission contracts in Botswana, Equatorial Guinea, and the Republic of Congo; and development of different plants and facilities in Nigeria.

"The Department of Justice is committed to enforcing the public corruption laws designed to ensure the integrity of our government," said Assistant Attorney General Fisher. "The Department will continue to hold public officials accountable for corrupt acts such as the bribery schemes outlined in today's indictment."

"The schemes charged are complex, but the essence of this case is simple: Mr. Jefferson corruptly traded on his good office, and on the Congress where he served as a Member of the United States House of Representatives, to enrich himself and his family through a pervasive pattern of fraud, bribery and corruption that spanned many years and two continents," said U.S. Attorney Rosenberg.


"The FBI has made combating public corruption its top criminal investigative priority because American citizens deserve honest and ethical public officials representing their interest," said Assistant Director Kenneth W. Kaiser, FBI Criminal Investigative Division.

"As it is alleged, Congressman Jefferson violated the public's trust and used his official position and office as a RICO enterprise to corruptly solicit bribes, to pay off a foreign official, and to illegally benefit from overseas business transactions during a five-year period. The FBI will continue to work with our local, state, federal and international partners to combat public corruption across all levels of government as no corrupt public servant is exempt from FBI scrutiny."

The indictment alleges that Jefferson knowingly conspired with Vernon L. Jackson, a Louisville, KY businessman, and Brett M. Pfeffer, a former Jefferson congressional staff member, and others as part of the bribery and corruption scheme. Jefferson allegedly discussed and solicited bribes in return for being influenced in the performance of certain official acts, including receiving things of value from iGate, Jackson's company. According to the indictment,

Jefferson also corruptly sought bribes from an individual identified in the indictment as a Cooperating Witness (CW) to be paid to family members. The indictment alleges, for example, that Jefferson required 5 percent to 7 percent of the CW's newly formed Nigerian company be given to members of Jefferson's family in exchange for his assistance. Jefferson allegedly made the request of the CW in December 2004 during a meeting in a congressional dining room.

The indictment further alleges that Jefferson violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act by allegedly offering, promising and making payments to a foreign official to advance the various business endeavors in which he and his family had financial interest. Jefferson was allegedly responsible for negotiating, offering and delivering payments of bribes to the official identified in the indictment as "Nigerian Official A."

According to the indictment, on or about July 18, 2005, Jefferson met with Nigerian Official A at the official's residence in Potomac, Md., and offered Official A a bribe to induce him to use his position to assist in obtaining commitments from NITEL, the government-controlled main telecommunications service provider in Nigeria.

On or before Aug. 3, 2005, at his residence in Washington, D.C., Jefferson allegedly secreted in his freezer $90,000 of the $100,000 in cash provided by the CW as part of the front-end bribe payment to Nigerian Official A. The cash was separated into $10,000 increments, wrapped in aluminum foil, and concealed inside various frozen food containers.

Jefferson faces a maximum of 235 years in prison if convicted on all counts. Jackson was sentenced to 87 months in prison after pleading guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit bribery and the payment of bribes to a public official. Pfeffer was sentenced to 96 months in prison after pleading guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit bribery and aiding and abetting the solicitation of bribes by a member of Congress.

Added 10K at 30 cents this morning. Placed a limited order good for day and sure enough, it executed.

ND9

Shale oil's time may have arrived

June 3, 2007, 1:31AM
Shale oil's time may have arrived
Experts cite new technology, high crude prices

By JOE CARROLL
Bloomberg News

Colorado and Utah have as much oil as Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Venezuela, Nigeria, Kuwait, Libya, Angola, Algeria, Indonesia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates combined.

That's not science fiction. Trapped in limestone up to 200 feet thick in the two Rocky Mountain states is enough so-called shale oil to rival OPEC and supply the U.S. for a century.

Exxon Mobil Corp. and Chevron Corp., the two biggest U.S. energy companies, and Royal Dutch Shell are spending $100 million a year testing new methods to separate the oil from the stone for as little as $30 a barrel. A growing number of industry executives and analysts say new technology and high prices make the idea feasible.

"The breakthrough is that now the oil companies have a way of getting this oil out of the ground without the massive energy and manpower costs that killed these projects in the 1970s," said Pete Stark, an analyst at IHS, an Englewood, Colo., research firm. "All the shale rocks in the world are going to be revisited now to see how much oil they contain."

The U.S. imports two-thirds of its oil, spending $300 billion a year, or 40 percent of the record trade deficit. Every $10 increase in a barrel of crude costs an American household $700 a year, according to the Rand Corp., founded in 1946 to provide research for the U.S. military. Oil prices have risen 63 percent since 2004 and higher fuel costs have slowed growth in the world's largest economy to the lowest in four years.

The last effort to exploit the Colorado and Utah shale fields foundered in the 1980s after crude prices tumbled 72 percent, resulting in a multibillion-dollar loss for Exxon. Techniques developed to coax crude from tar sands in Alberta, 1,600 miles to the north, may help the U.S. projects' engineers.


Cooking the shale
"The potential for shale is large," said Joseph Stanislaw, senior energy adviser for Deloitte & Touche and co-author with oil analyst Daniel Yergin of The Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy. "Assuming the technology proves out, the size and scale of the reserves are significant."

Energy providers are investing in shale oil production because the reserves are large enough to generate higher returns than smaller fields in Oklahoma and Texas, where output is declining after eight decades.

Shale is also a more attractive investment than new U.S. refineries, which Shell and Chevron say may lose money as rising use of crop-based fuels such as ethanol lowers domestic gasoline demand. Exxon says it isn't interested in building new fuel plants in the U.S. because the company expects North American fuel consumption to peak by 2025.

"You're going to build refineries where demand is increasing, and that's the developing world," Scott Nauman, Exxon Mobil's manager of economics and energy planning, said in a May 18 presentation at a University of Chicago oil conference.


Shell's project
In the high desert near Rifle, Colo., Shell engineers are burying hundreds of steel rods 2,000 feet underground that will heat the shale to 700 degrees Fahrenheit, a temperature at which Teflon melts.

The heat will be applied for the next four years to convert the hydrocarbons from dead plants and plankton, once part of a prehistoric lake, into high-quality crude that is equal parts jet fuel, diesel and naphtha, the main ingredient in gasoline.

Chevron, which helped build the Saudi Arabian energy industry when it struck oil in the kingdom in 1938, plans to shatter 200-foot thick layers of shale deep underground, said Robert Lestz, the company's oil-shale technology manager.

Rather than using heat to transform the shale into crude, Chevron plans to saturate the rubble with chemicals to convert it. The method will reduce power needs and production costs, Lestz said.

Using chemical reactions to get oil from shale also means fewer byproducts such as ash and fewer greenhouse gases, he said.


'Brute force'
Chevron scientists are working with researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico to determine which chemicals work best for converting shale to crude oil. Shell's heating technique amounts to "a brute-force approach," said Lestz, who is based in Houston.

Raytheon Co., the maker of Tomahawk missiles and the first microwave ovens, is developing a process that would use radio waves to cook the shale.

Irving-based Exxon Mobil plans to shoot particles of petroleum coke, a waste byproduct of oil refining, into cracks in the shale. The coke will be electrically charged to create a subterranean hot plate that will cook the shale until it turns into crude.

"These are quite remarkable technological approaches," said Jeremy Boak, a geologist at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden, who spent 11 years cleaning up radioactive waste and disposing of weapons-grade plutonium at U.S. government sites. "The oil companies don't have the exploration problem of finding resources to drill. We know the oil is here. It's just a matter of getting it out."

U.S. oil shale deposits likely hold 1.5 trillion barrels of oil, according to Jack Dyni, a geologist emeritus at the U.S. Geological Survey. All 12 OPEC countries combined have proven crude oil reserves of about 911 billion barrels, led by Saudi Arabia, with 264.2 billion barrels, according to statistics compiled by BP.

Skeptics of the potential for shale oil include Cathy Kay, an organizer for the environmental group Western Colorado Congress, who says the techniques will drain water supplies, scar the landscape and require so much power the skies will be choked with smoke from coal-fed generators.

"They are going to do absolutely massive environmental damage," said Kay, a South African native who's been spearheading the Grand Junction, Colo., group's anti-shale campaign since September.

"Why don't these companies invest these giant sums of money developing the cheapest, cleverest solar panel or geothermal process, instead of chasing this elusive oil?" Kay asked.

Shell, based in the Hague, estimates it can extract oil from Colorado shale for $30 a barrel, less than half Friday's close of $65.08 for light, sweet crude on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Jeff Schrull comments - I went back and was listening to the recent 5/29 Addax webcast presentation......... I don't see page numbers - anyway, on the "JDZ Prospect Inventory" page, I think he says, "there are a couple of billion barrel fields, several 4 or 5 million barrel fields"....

I will go back later and listen again.

ND9

I'm not so sure about that. Read this sentence again:

the Commission issued a formal order of private investigation authorizing its staff to investigate whether ERHC Energy Inc., a Colorado-incorporated, publicly-traded company operating out of Houston, Texas ("ERHC"), and others may have violated certain of the anti-bribery, books and records, and internal controls provisions of the federal securities laws.

That sounds like they are investigating ERHC.

ND9

Tryoty - great find. thanks. ND9 EOM

Or maybe he just got tired of working for a super major filled with lots of bureaucracy....... Sometimes, it gets frustrating working for large super-majors like XOM, Chevron, etc...... Some of the smaller oil companies have more streamlined operations and thus, sometimes, you just want to leave a big company and go work for a small oil company.... because you get fed up with the politics, bureaucracy, promotion practices, etc...... and decide to move to a smaller company. It happens all the time.

ND9

I thought it was also interesting that at the end, there were no questions (during question and answer session).

ND9

Dancing with elephants
by Tamara Walid on Sunday, 27 May 2007

http://www.arabianbusiness.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13134

High powered: RAK Petroleum’s Philip Turberville has been in the business for over 30 years.


next »"Dancing with elephants," is one of Philip Turberville's favourite phrases. And if you talk to him you'll soon hear the Scottish RAK Petroleum CEO use it to describe the important advantage that smaller oil and gas companies have over the sector's international giants.

"It's important, if you are dealing with Shells, BPs and ADNOCs, that you can dance around those big giants. You don't want to be crushed by them, and equally you want to dance, but you don't want to be an elephant yourself," he says.

The trick lies in finding the balance between being big and being able to move quickly, according to Turberville. Moreimportantly, however, is gaining the trust of resource owners.

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It’s important, if you are dealing with Shells, BPs and ADNOCs, that you can dance around those big giants."I'm not saying that the big multinational companies are mistrusted by the resource owners, but there is a natural skepticism and tension around giving all of this profit to a big multinational company that's misaligned with our sovereign interests," says Turberville in a soft Scottish accent.

So far, RAK Petroleum's own interests seem to be exactly where Turberville wants them to be. The company has only recently announced its 2006 first year net profits of US$50m, while its current authorised capital amounts to US$1.36bn. As RAK Petroleum's focus in the past year was evaluating investment and acquisition opportunities, it has managed to finalise a number of deals. Aside from acquiring all of Indago Petroleum's exploration and production assets last month, the company will also strengthen its grip on all the issued and to-be-issued share capital of Gulf Keystone, in addition to an earlier investment in Anzon Energy Limited.

RAK Petroleum's recent growth could largely be attributed to the acquisition of Indago, which brought about access to an abundance of assets and technical skills. The company now has a technical team in Dubai whereas previously it relied on consulting part-time support.

"We also came of age in terms of having a good management team. We had in our ownership [of Indago] production, development and exploration assets so we've moved from being a financial or investing company, to an operating oil and gas company," he says.

Although Turberville admits that RAK Petroleum will never reach a scale that would enable it to rival national energy giants like ADNOC or ARAMCO, he thinks of that as an advantage.

"It's not in RAK Petroleum's vision to be big for big's sake," he says, adding: "Getting bigger will come with success, but one should certainly avoid the trap of becoming big and cumbersome. Keeping that dynamic, small, focused mentality inside a larger capital structure is what I think we will become."

The energy business consumes a lot of capital, which Turberville believes makes scale important. For Turberville, a very good job would constitute RAK Petroleum hitting a market value of US$10bn in 10 years' time, from the current figure of just over US$1bn.

Formed on 27 September 2005, Turberville tells the story of RAK Petroleum which starts with the Crown Prince of RAK preparing for the development of his emirate and utilising its natural resources. This sparked the development of many businesses across the northern emirate, accompanied with the dawning realization that RAK lacked a competitive energy company that would manage its energy needs, and also develop relationships on a broader level in the region to further knowledge and profitability in the oil and gas business.

"In 2005, share capital of US$816.9m was raised. Then during 2006, the patron management team looked around at interesting areas of investment and then an entire management team was appointed.

"I was elected and appointed as the CEO in July 2006," says Turberville, adding: "We then presented a strategy to the board showing what could make RAK Petroleum distinctive, and set about finding and subsequently acquiring assets that fitted that strategy."

This was based on what Turberville calls "RAK's competitive points of advantage", including its geographical location and political connections.

"The management team concluded that these geographical political factors could be applied to our advantage in pursuit of the commercialisation of gas," he says.

Gas is the more challenging of the two hydrocarbons, he explains, as oil remains relatively easy to transport and sell, while gas is more complex to transport and store, and therefore more complex to sell.

"Historically gas has been sold at a discount to oil, and it has become very political and complicated. As a result, we thought that gas commercialisation should be a key pillar of our strategy. Not to the exclusion of oil, however, because oil and gas are found together traditionally," he says.

The other focus of RAK Petroleum's strategy was prioritising the geographical area in and around the Arabian Gulf, Persian Gulf and the broader Islamic Arab world, including the North Africa region.

On the challenge of working with gas, Turberville says RAK's political connections and business contacts in RAK, Umm Al Quwain, Sharjah, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and Oman have enabled the company to pursue the required series of stakeholders through dialogue and negotiations.

"You have to work extensively and patiently with different stake holders, resource owners, and different host governments who control the natural resource, as well as the end customers. Then you bring those in together through pipeline systems so you need good exceptional commercial terms, good relationships, and the ability to connect sources of supply with customers," he says.

Turberville points out that although these discussions do not take on a linear nature, the company was able to achieve "good progress" during the last nine months. He explains that there is a nucleus of core relationships as the ruling Al Qassimi family in RAK enjoys a heritage that links back to southern Iran.

"Iran has always been a trading partner of the emirates, particularly the northern areas. There are several stakeholders we've been coming into contact with regularly," he says.

Another characteristic of dealing with gas, Turberville explains, is that the demand for the natural source is cyclical.

"There are high peaks of demand in the summer in certain parts of the world like the Gulf, and high demands in less temperate climates in the winter months. The seasonality and inability to easily store gas creates another opportunity or challenge. This makes gas commercialisation discussions intricate," he says.



I have a passionate belief in helping resource-owner countries bring about the best energy solutions.If working in a developing emirate like RAK poses any challenges, to Turberville they are nonexistent. He draws a very positive image.

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"It's a great place to work, it's a vibrant dynamic environment, and the huge benefit is that you're very close to the political power-base, including certain opinion makers in the region. You are invited when there are visiting delegations, or political delegations visiting other countries. It's a very obvious and proactive source of advantage," he says.

Such an advantage, Turberville believes, would not be accessible if the company operated in other parts of the UAE. "Clearly you'd be aligned more closely with a different kind of power base," he says, adding that the beauty about being based in RAK is that the emirate is currently in a phase of expansion which makes it very dynamic.

"I can't speak for Dubai or Abu Dhabi, but a company like RAK Petroleum might get lost in that shear scale. I think a young fast-moving emirate, and a young fast-moving company, are obviously good stable mates," he says.

Turberville also thinks it's integral for RAK Petroleum to keep its "Arab heritage" and political power base which he considers a very significant part of its brand.

"We don't want to be seen as a profit-hungry company. We want to be profitable, we want to make money, but we don't want to be seen as an exploitative company. A partnership approach - easy to say but difficult to deliver - is very important to the success of this company," he says.

Well-founded and carefully analysed decisions, however, do not necessarily mean slow reactions, according to Turberville. One has to be able to make quick decisions, but also well-founded ones with focus and prioritisation as a discipline and "not the bureaucracy of studying for the sake of studying", as he puts it.

This might explain why RAK Petroleum has resisted listing on the DIFX so far. "It will happen at the right time," says Turberville, adding that although the company would like it to materialise as soon as possible, being a young company makes it very important to deliver to shareholders and potential shareholders a "track record of success", so that understanding the strategy and the delivery of the listing becomes more feasible.

"Then they will reward you for that," he says, adding that achievements and financial market conditions have to be appropriate for a successful IPO, which in turn takes some time.

"Towards the end of 2008 is more realistic than the end of 2007, but it will also be the earliest opportunity consistent with delivering exceptional shareholder value," he adds.

Turberville explains that the decision to not give dividends to shareholders this year is due to the company being at a particular stage of growth.

Currently, it evaluates investment opportunities as well as examining the best use of shareholders' money to reinvest back into the expanding business.

"It's fairly typical of a growth company that you don't pay dividends in the early years of your growth cycle," he says.

RAK Petroleum has recently been linked to the troubled Crescent Petroleum and Dana Gas deal, however, Turberville dismisses any rumours suggesting that the company is about to intercede.

"I think it's inappropriate to speculate on that subject. There seems to be a firm contract between Iran and Crescent so it's up to those two parties to sort it out," he says, diplomatically.

The energy company, however, will be keeping an open eye on the Middle East and North Africa region. In time, it might also venture into the Caspian region, especially Islamic countries such as Turkmenistan. "Iraq remains a very challenging area in the Gulf region, but in time those very interesting and prolific hydrocarbon provinces are areas that we would like to work in from the medium-to-long term," reveals Turberville.

Challenges, however, seem to be exactly what Turberville is looking for. With over 30 years experience in several areas of the energy industry, the CEO has worked with the likes of Royal Dutch Shell and operated internationally in several parts of the world including the Middle East, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, US, and Nigeria.

Turberville has also worked in the gas and electricity business with US-based GXU. Now, after working with giants, or what he likes to call "big elephants", he is determined to share that experience with RAK Petroleum.

"You'll see that that experience of many prolific resource-owner countries and the subject of gas-electricity converges around this gas commercialisation, and this is a strategic focus for RAK Petroleum," he says.

Turberville attributes his decision to make the transition from working with multinationals, to becoming the CEO of a young company, as due to his being "an international gypsy".

"I have a passionate belief in helping resource-owner countries bring about the best energy solutions, rather than having them forced on them by big multinational oil companies," he says, adding: "In terms of the social and economic fairness and the importance of harnessing energy at fair value, and in a world where it's becoming increasingly difficult to get the right balance between energy conservation and energy neutralisation, you feel you're giving something back to society."

So far, Turberville is convinced that there is no shortage of professional, technical, financial, manual, or labour skill in RAK. In five years' time, he expects RAK Petroleum to grow into a US$5bn market capitalization company which is also internationally recognised as a dynamic and fair provider of top-notch energy solutions.

At present, RAK Petroleum is exploring oil and gas in Jebel Hafit in the Sultanate of Oman, and is busy with an investment program in the Strait of Hormuz in West Bukha. The company's recent investments have reached an impressive US$800m.

In the next year, as RAK Petroleum moves from being a financial investment company to an operating entity with a return of 6% on all start-up expenses, Turberville says 2007 will not be a revenue generating phase.

"We are in the building phase and what should be looked at are the projected revenues for 2008, 2009 and 2010, as a signal of vibrant growth. 2008 will be a year of transition from an adequate yield to a high capital appreciation," he says.

The CEO ends on an optimistic note saying that if there is any way he can help a "vibrant, impressive, young emirate deliver exciting solutions on the global energy stage, that's quite a good final act to a 30-year energy career".

Obasanjo leaves Nigeria uncertain future By DULUE MBACHU, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 31 minutes ago

LAGOS, Nigeria - When Olusegun Obasanjo was elected Nigeria's president in 1999, Nigerians hoped long years of military misrule were behind them and stable democracy was ahead.

As he leaves office Tuesday, Nigeria's democracy is in doubt, and its people seem uncertain of their future. But Obasanjo, a 70-year-old former military leader, is credited with making economic strides, and earned respect abroad for his efforts to secure peace across Africa. While he will no longer be president, his influence in Africa's most populous country will likely remain strong.

Many of his critics say he failed woefully. Obasanjo, though, counts his greatest achievements in terms of intangibles.

"Democracy is not a destination, it's a journey," Obasanjo said in a nationally televised farewell address Monday. "We are well on our way to a greater destination."

Term limits kept Obasanjo from running again, and he says he will be a farmer after he leaves office. But last-minute political engineering has ensured a powerful party position for him: chairman of the party's board of trustees. A daughter, Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello, won a senate seat on his party's ticket in April elections and is likely to help keep the family name in the limelight. His wife Stella died in 2005.

Umaru Yar'Adua, picked by Obasanjo to lead his People's Democratic Party ticket, was declared winner of the elections that domestic and international observers said were deeply flawed. Yar'Adua takes office Tuesday, but has been battling a crisis of legitimacy since the vote.

"After eight years, Obasanjo is leaving Nigeria the way he met it," said Emma Ezeazu, who leads the Alliance for Credible Elections, an umbrella of civic groups campaigning to end the country's history of vote-rigging. "We have a tradition of rigged elections but he has given us the most-rigged election in the country's history."

When Obasanjo took office in 1999, his credentials were among the most impressive of Nigerian politicians. He succeeded an assassinated predecessor as military ruler of the country in the 1970s, then became the first military ruler in Africa to voluntarily transfer power to an elected civilian government in 1979.

Retiring to his farm on the outskirts of the country's biggest city, Lagos, Obasanjo set up the Africa Leadership Forum and became an international statesman renowned for its governance advice to other African countries. When the military toppled the civilian government that succeeded him, Obasanjo became a vocal critic of the autocratic regimes that spanned more than 15 years.

Obasanjo was charged with plotting to topple Gen. Sani Abacha in 1995 and given a life jail term that was later reduced to 15 years. Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar, who succeeded Abacha on his death in 1998, freed his old friend Obasanjo.

Obasanjo won the elections that followed by a landslide. He vowed to tackle Nigeria's debilitating corruption and abysmal power supply situation, as well as heal ethnic and religious wounds that made the country prone to upheavals.

Obasanjo said Monday his restive nation of 140 million people, split among 250 ethnic groups and almost equally between northern-based Muslims and southern Christians, had grown more united under his tenure.

"We have become simply Nigerians interested in the development and progress of our country. This is a great gain," he said.

Obasanjo had also pledged to make Nigeria a leader on the continent. He ended his tenure with a farewell tour of Sierra Leone and Liberia, where he played a leading role in bringing peace after years of civil war. He has sent Nigerian peacekeepers to several African hot spots, and hosted talks aimed at ending the bloodshed in Sudan's Darfur region.

But after eight years in office, many complain that Nigeria is still rife with problems. The country's infrastructure has decayed, and fuel shortages and power cuts — which Obasanjo promised to end within two years of assuming office in Africa's leading energy producer — have hit their worst levels in the country's history.

The oil sector remains volatile, with attacks by militants claiming a greater share of the country's exports and shaking world markets. Corruption remains endemic.

"The public was betrayed on so many levels," said Nigerian Nobel literature laureate Wole Soyinka, who with 48 fellow laureates from around the world called for new elections. Of Obasanjo, the writer says: "Reluctantly I've been forced to conclude that he's a dictator at heart."

Some critics, like Olisa Agbakoba, a human rights lawyer and president of the Nigerian lawyers professional body, make a distinction between his political failings and economic achievements.

"His politics pulled him down," Agbakoba said, citing Obasanjo's failed attempt to amend the constitution in order to run for a third term in office. "On the economic front I think there is progress."

Agbakoba said Nigeria paid off its foreign debt of more than $32 billion in a deal Obasanjo's government negotiated with the Paris Club of creditors last year. New economic partnerships forged with China have reduced dependence on the West, Agbakoba added.

But many of the problems he promised to solve appear likely to remain long after he is gone.

"At the time Obasanjo came to power, Nigeria was completely divided by years of military misrule," said Ezeazu, the elections monitor. "He has spent eight years not healing any wounds."

Tapco1, the date doesn't really matter. I posted the article because over the last week or so, there were a bunch of posts on this board about why SEO doesn't accept any of these so called offers and sell now...... and so I posted the article to quote SEO saying that Nigeria needs to started supplying the needs of the local energy industry and be self sufficient.

Well, that was his philosophy then and maybe it's still his philosophy now? Who knows?

ND9

SEO says Nigerians need to be self sufficient.
Maybe he wants to keep ERHC for long term? Who knows.

Read article below - link attached.

ND9
**********************************

Another active local oil firm is Chrome Group, chaired by Sir Emeka C. Offor. It owns U.S.-listed Environmental Remediation Holding Corporation (ERHC) and various other subsidiaries. Through ERHC, it aims to gain a foothold in the lucrative waters between Nigeria and São Tomé and Principe, following a 2003 licensing round.

Sir Offor says it is time Nigerians started supplying the needs of the local energy industry. “In the oil and gas sector, almost everything is imported – pipes, tubes, fittings and most importantly technology,” he says. “It is time for us to take care of these elements and become self-sufficient.”

http://www.pressnet-dc.com/nigeria/oilindustry04.asp

Balance - thanks - EOM.

I guess Chrome didn't win PH Refinery bid - see article below and then farther down, another article stating Chrome was part of Essar team.
ND9
************************************
Nigeria: Dangote, Otedola, Transcorp Buy PH Refinery for N72bn

This Day (Lagos)

18 May 2007
Posted to the web 18 May 2007

Kunle Aderinokun and Onyebuchi Ezigbo
Abuja

Bluestar Oil Services Limited Consortium, a Nigerian consortium comprising Dangote Group, Zenon Oil, Transnational Corporation of Nigeria (Transcorp) and Rivers State government yesterday emerged the preferred bidder/core investor for Port Harcourt Refinery Company. The consortium submitted a bid of $561 million (N71.808 billion) for 51 per cent of Federal Government's equity in the ailing crude oil refining company.

The sale of the refinery, however, comes against the backdrop of protest by National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NU-PENG), which members yesterday shut down operations of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) Lagos, Port Harcourt, Mosimi and Kaduna.


But the transaction for the Kaduna Refinery and Petr-oleum Company (KRPC), which received only one bid for 51 per cent Federal Government's stake was not concluded as China National Petroleum Corporation offered $102 million, which was below the reserve price. The offer by the Chinese firm would have to be ratified by the National Council on Privatisation (NCP).

Bluestar consortium immediately paid $300 million, re-presenting more than 50 per cent of the bid price for the company, in line with the payment mechanism of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) for the transaction. The consortium is expected to pay the 50 per cent balance of the purchase consideration into a designated account by 4 pm of the seventh working day immediately following the official notification of a successful bid.

The sale of the Port Harcourt Refinery, which involved Oando Plc and Refinee Petroplus Nigeria Limited as bidders was part of the financial bids opening for 18 transactions conducted inside the Congress Hall of Transcorp Hilton Hotel, Abuja. Oando and Refinee Petroplus were, however, disqualified for failing to include a draft of 50 per cent of their bid prices in the envelopes submitted to BPE.

The 18 transactions included Lagos International Trade Fair Complex; National Arts Theatre and Tafawa Balewa Square; Egbin Power Plc; Onigbolo Cement Company, Benin Republic; Ayip-Eku Oil Palm Company; eight Liquefied Petroleum Gas depots; Ajaokuta Steel Complex, Coal Blocks and Mining Titles.

Onigbolo Cement Company of Republic of Benin in which the Federal Government owns 35 per cent was bought by Dangote Group for $1.781 billion. Dangote Group, the nation's major cement producer was, however, the only bidder for the company. The Group has already paid 10 per cent of the bid price ($178 million), although the rule of the transaction provides that the first 10 per cent of the purchase consideration must be paid into a designated account on or before 12 midnight of the 10th working day immediately following the official notification of a successful bid.

The remaining 90 per cent would be paid into BPE's designated account latest by 12 midnight of the working days immediately following the official notification of the successful bid.

Egbin Power Plc, presently managed by Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO) /Energy Resources was bought by the same company at $280 million.

Also, Ajaokuta Steel Company Complex hitherto on concession to Global Infrastructure Nigeria Limited was converted to joint venture partnership on a 60 per cent to 40 per cent basis between Global Infrastructure and the Federal Government respectively. Yesterday's bid opening saw the former paying $525 million for its own 60 per cent stake.

The National Arts Theatre, which attracted bids from eight prospective concessionaires, went to Infrastructica, which emerged preferred bidder with N35.84 billion for a 35-year concession. Jadeas Trust, which offered N28.902 billion, was declared the reserved bidder.

Similarly, Tafawa Balewa Square, which had a 25-year concession arrangement, was snapped up by BHS International for N9.5 billion. Black Swan followed with N9.2 billion as reserve bidder. The Lagos International Trade Fair Complex with a similar 25 years concession was won by AulicNigeria Limited with a bid of N40 billion while Unison Property Development is the reserve bidder.

For the LPG depots, Sahara Energy Resources Limited bought Calabar depot for $11.1 million while MRS Oil and Gas was the reserve bidder with $10 million; MRS Oil and Gas got Kano depot for $4 million. The bids of Brockport Limited ($3m) for Enugu depot; Le-Global ($1.05m) for Ibadan depot; Le-Global ($1.948m) for Ilorin depot and Global Gas and Refining, which offered $250,000 were all below the reserve prices and would have their offers ratified by the NCP.

Chairman of the Bluestar Oil Services Limited Consortium and President, Dangote Group of Companies, Alhaji Aliko Dangote said Nigerian entrepreneurs must take the lead in the nation's march towards greatness. "I feel very great. There is nobody that will come and grow our own economy more than us and that is why we are heavily investing because we believe it is our own economy, we believe in the country and we believe in the economic policy of Nigeria. That's why we are here to make sure that we bid and win," he said.

*********************************************
Essar eyes Nigerian refinery
Business Standard - May 11, 2006 Nevin John

An Essar Oil-led consortium of three companies is moving closer to acquiring 51 per cent in the Nigerian government-run Port Harcourt Refining Company, one of the four refineries slated for privatisation.The refinery has a 60,000-barrels-per-day capacity.

Petroleum India International (PII), a single-window organisation of the local petroleum industry, which provides technical services in the refining space, is also in the race with another consortium as a technical partner.

"Four parties are bidding for the Nigerian government's 51 per cent stake in Port Harcourt Refining Company. The price of the stake can be around $300 million," oil industry sources said. The four are the Oando group of Nigeria and three consortia led by Transnational Corporation of Nigeria, Essar Oil and Refinee Petroplus of the UK. Chrome Oil of the US and Chinese Petroleum Corporation are the members of the Essar Oil-led consortium.

Essar executives did not comment on the bid. The Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) of Nigeria had earlier twice rejected all technical bids submitted by the four parties vying for the refinery. In November last year, when technical bids were invited for the second time, the Oando consortium, the Refinee Petroplus consortium and the Transnational Corporation consortium presented the same technical partner_ Petroleum India International_ in contradiction of the bidding rules. Due to this, their bids were automatically disqualified.

After getting clarification from the companies, the BPE had issued revised requests for proposals for the third time. The technical bids were opened on April 25 and are being evaluated. At the next stage, technically qualified bidders will proceed to put up financial bids.

The Nigerian government has stake in the four refineries that have been slated for privatisation. The government is looking for private participation in other public enterprises, including 16 power companies, a liquefied petroleum gas plant, Abuja Airport, Lagos Airport and some Nigerian ports.

Balance Builder - I recently returned from a long trip to Europe and so I'm still catching up on the news.... I was wondering if you saw this article, posted on May 22. It's an Addax article that basically announces the results of an exploration study. The JDZ Blocks 2, 3, 4 unrisked and risked numbers look pretty low..... I've cut and pasted article but it's difficult to read table - so I've also included link.

What do you think about those numbers? Do they seem low to you? Any thoughts appreciated.

ND9

http://www.prnewswire.co.uk/cgi/news/release?id=198539

********************************************************
News Release
Tuesday 22 May 2007, 12:47 GMT Tuesday 22 May 2007
Addax Petroleum Corporation


Addax Petroleum Announces Results of Exploration Potential Study


CALGARY, Canada, May 22 /PRNewswire/ --

- Unrisked Prospective Oil Resources Estimated to be 1,307 MMbbl, Approximately 3.7 Times the Corporation's Proved Plus Probable Reserves

Addax Petroleum Corporation ("Addax Petroleum" or the "Corporation") (TSX: AXC), today announces the results of a prospective oil and contingent gas resources report prepared by Netherland, Sewell & Associates Inc., independent oil and natural gas reservoir engineers ("NSAI" and the "NSAI Resources Report"), issued in connection with the Corporation's previously announced intended secondary listing on the London Stock Exchange. The NSAI Resource Report evaluates the Corporation's identified prospective oil resources and contingent gas resources. The NSAI Resource Report is contained within the UK listing prospectus which is available at www.addaxpetroleum.com.

As at December 31, 2006, NSAI estimates working interest best estimate unrisked gross prospective oil resources for the Corporation to be 1,307 MMbbl and the corresponding risked estimate to be 670 MMbbl. In addition, NSAI estimates working interest best estimate gross contingent gas resources for the Corporation's properties to be 1,583 Bcf. The prospective oil resources and contingent gas resources are in addition to the Corporation's proved, probable and possible reserves as reported by the Corporation on January 18, 2007.

CEO's Comment

Commenting today, Addax Petroleum's President and Chief Executive Officer, Jean Claude Gandur, said: "The independent assessment by NSAI of our prospective oil and contingent gas resources clearly demonstrates the upside potential of Addax Petroleum. We have built and continue to build a true E&P company that has a balance of both significant cash flow generating production and high impact exploration potential. We have also assembled the capabilities required, including a high quality exploration team, for us to develop and realize on the substantial upside identified in the NSAI Resource Report."

The NSAI Resources Report was prepared for the Corporation at the direction of Addax Petroleum's Technical and Reserves Committee, using assumptions and methodology guidelines outlined in the Canadian Oil and Gas Evaluation Handbook ("COGEH") and in accordance with National Instrument 51-101. In this context, the prospective oil resources are defined as those quantities of oil estimated to be contained in accumulations yet to be discovered while the contingent gas resources are defined as those quantities of gas estimated to be potentially recoverable from known accumulations but are not currently economic. All prospective oil resource estimates referred to in this press release denote, if discovered, recoverable quantities reported as the most likely or best estimates and limited to the Corporation's working interest after giving effect to government back-in rights, where applicable. All contingent gas resource estimates referred to in this press release relate to the Corporation's working interest in its producing Nigeria license areas and denote discovered recoverable quantities prior to giving effect to government back-in rights, if any.

Selected Prospective Oil Resources Highlights

In undertaking its assessment of prospective oil resources, NSAI relied upon the prospect, lead and work-in-progress inventory developed by Addax Petroleum as at December 31, 2006. At that time, the Corporation's prospect and lead inventory was more developed in some license areas and less so in others. The Corporation considers its exploration prospect inventory to be well developed for its shallow water and onshore Nigeria license areas, to be partially developed for its Cameroon and deepwater Gulf of Guinea license areas, to be predominantly undeveloped in its license areas in Gabon and yet to be developed the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Development of a complete exploration prospect inventory for each license area includes the acquisition, processing, interpretation of seismic or geological mapping of prospects. The following table summarises selected prospective oil resources information as at December 31, 2006:


-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Best Estimate
Number of Overall Prospective Oil Resources
prospects Chance of -----------------------
Area reviewed Success Unrisked Risked
----------------------------------------------------------------------
acres % MMbbl MMbbl

Shallow water and onshore Nigeria
---------------------------------

OML123 90,700 29 61% 179 110
OML124 74,100 2 44% 36 16
OML126 178,300 3 39% 94 37
OML137 209,800 4 36% 137 50
Okwok 9,000 - - - -
Sub-total 561,900 38 48% 446 214

Shallow water Cameroon
----------------------

Ngosso 70,300 9 70% 37 26
Sub-total 70,300 9 70% 37 26

Deep Water Gulf of Guinea
-------------------------

JDZ (2,3 & 4) 130,300 18 79% 286 225
OPL291, Nigeria 230,600 2 36% 456 164
Sub-total 360,900 20 52% 742 389

Gabon
-----

Onshore 317,200 3 35% 17 6
Offshore 973,300 12 55% 65 36
Sub-total 1,290,500 15 51% 82 42

Kurdistan Region of Iraq
------------------------

Taq Taq 105,800 - - - -
Sub-total 105,800 - - - -
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total 2,389,400 82 51% 1,307 670
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------


Since December 31, 2006, Addax Petroleum has undertaken exploration activity on its OML123 and OML137 license areas, offshore Nigeria. On OML123, the Corporation successfully explored and appraised the Antan prospect, whereas on OML137, the Corporation is currently drilling the Ofrima North prospect and has encountered gas and oil zones.

Selected Contingent Gas Resource Highlights

In respect of contingent gas resources, the NSAI Resource Report is limited to the Corporation's producing license areas in the shallow water and onshore license areas in Nigeria. They are categorized as contingent because the commerciality of the gas resources and the Corporation's rights to produce the gas resources have yet to be established. The following table summarises selected contingent gas resources information as at December 31, 2006, including associated gas liquids quantities:


------------------------------------------------------------------------
Contingent Gas Resources(1) Associated Gas Liquids(2)
(Bcf) (MMbbl)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
OML123 974 14.7
OML124 362 22.7
OML126 69 0.0
Okwok 7 0.0
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total 1,412 37.4
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------

(1) includes deductions for plant fuel and extraction of gas liquids
(2) includes LPG and C5+


The Corporation is presently in negotiation with Nigerian government authorities for the development of the contingent gas resources from the Corporation's license areas.

About Addax Petroleum

Addax Petroleum is an international oil and gas exploration and production company with a strategic focus on West Africa and the Middle East. Addax Petroleum is one of the largest independent oil producers in West Africa and has increased its crude oil production from an average of 8,800 bbl/d for 1998 to an average of approximately 116,000 bbl/d for the first quarter of 2007. Further information about Addax Petroleum is available at www.addaxpetroleum.com or at www.sedar.com.

Important Information

This press release does not constitute an offer to sell, or the solicitation of an offer to buy, exchange or transfer any securities of Addax Petroleum. The value of Addax Petroleum's common shares can go down as well as up and past performance cannot be relied on as a guide to future performance.

Legal Notice - Forward-Looking Statements

Certain statements in this press release constitute forward-looking statements under applicable securities legislation. Such statements are generally identifiable by the terminology used, such as "anticipate", "believe", "intend", "expect", "plan", "estimate", "budget", "outlook" or other similar wording. Forward-looking information includes, but is not limited to, reference to business strategy and goals, future capital and other expenditures, reserves and resources estimates, drilling plans, construction and repair activities, the submission of development plans, seismic activity, production levels and the sources of growth thereof, project development schedules and results, results of exploration activities and dates by which certain areas may be developed or may come on-stream, royalties payable, financing and capital activities, contingent liabilities, and environmental matters. By its very nature, such forward-looking information requires Addax Petroleum to make assumptions that may not materialize or that may not be accurate. This forward-looking information is subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties and other factors, which may cause actual results, levels of activity and achievements to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such information. Such factors include, but are not limited to: imprecision of reserves and resources estimates, ultimate recovery of reserves, prices of oil and natural gas, general economic, market and business conditions; industry capacity; competitive action by other companies; fluctuations in oil prices; refining and marketing margins; the ability to produce and transport crude oil and natural gas to markets; the effects of weather and climate conditions; the results of exploration and development drilling and related activities; fluctuation in interest rates and foreign currency exchange rates; the ability of suppliers to meet commitments; actions by governmental authorities, including increases in taxes; decisions or approvals of administrative tribunals; changes in environmental and other regulations; risks attendant with oil and gas operations, both domestic and international; international political events; expected rates of return; and other factors, many of which are beyond the control of Addax Petroleum. More specifically, production may be affected by such factors as exploration success, start-up timing and success, facility reliability, reservoir performance and natural decline rates, water handling, and drilling progress. Capital expenditures may be affected by cost pressures associated with new capital projects, including labour and material supply, project management, drilling rig rates and availability, and seismic costs. These factors are discussed in greater detail in filings made by Addax Petroleum with the Canadian provincial securities commissions.

Readers are cautioned that the foregoing list of important factors affecting forward-looking information is not exhaustive. Furthermore, the forward-looking information contained in this press release is made as of the date of this press release and, except as required by applicable law, Addax Petroleum does not undertake any obligation to update publicly or to revise any of the included forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. The forward-looking information contained in this press release is expressly qualified by this cautionary statement.

Distributed by PR Newswire on behalf of Addax Petroleum Corporation


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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IOC, OIL to pick up 35% in Nigerian block
RAJEEV JAYASWAL

TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ MONDAY, MAY 28, 2007 01:45:17 AM]


NEW DELHI: IndianOil (IOC) and Oil India Ltd (OIL) are set to pick up a 50% equity stake in Suntera Nigeria OPL 205 Ltd with an investment of over $60 million.

The company holds 70% interest in the onland block 'Oil Prospecting License (OPL)-205' in the northern part of Niger delta with a hydrocarbon discovery.

IOC and OIL will each get pick up 25% each in the company, promoted by Suntera Resources of Cyprus. Together, IOC and OIL will have 35% interest in the oil asset. The IOC board is expected to clear the investment on Monday. “A decision in this regard is expected to be taken by the board on Monday,” an IOC official said.

The block was earlier held by Summit Oil International of Nigeria with 100% interest. Suntera Resources picked up 70% interest in the block through its wholly-owned subsidiary Suntera Nigeria OPL 205 Ltd (which will turn into a JV).

Besides taking equity stake, IOC and OIL would pay $7.5 million to Suntera Nigeria 205 as loan to the JV. The JV would pay an interest of 8.5% per annum when it makes the final repayment of the principle. The repayment date likely to be December 31, 2010. Earlier, Suntera Resources had paid $15 million to Summit Oil for acquiring the hydrocarbon asset. The amount was treated as loan to Suntera Nigeria 205.

Summit Oil, founded in 1990, was granted OPL 205 in 1990. It acquired 2D seismic in 1991 and drilled the first exploration well in the first quarter of 1992, which discovered the Otien Field on OPL 205.

Spec29 - you're not on a message board trying to get rich off an insurance company or some congressman. You are on ERHC's message board. They are trying to strike oil so they can sell it, get it refined, and then some of it will be sold at the gas pumps. So ERHC and you (& myself) are trying to make big money off ERHC via the gas pumps and other products......... so the gas pumps you just criticized as "ripping us off" are a source of revenue for yourself.

So you made a hypocritical statement. If you don't understand that, then you either don't have a dictionary, or you aren't living in reality.

ND9

Spec29 - you said, "we're getting ripped off at the pump everyday". Yet, you've invested in an oil company that will take advantage of those very high prices at the pump. So you're trying to make a profit off the industry which you say is ripping us off.

You might want to look up the word "hypocrite".

ND9

Sinopec and CNOOC Sign Gas Cooperation Agreement in Bid to Rival CNPC

By Randall Jensen and Michelle Yaun
22 May 2007 at 08:25 AM GMT-04:00


SHANGHAI (Interfax-China) -- The China Petroleum & Chemical Cooperation (Sinopec) [NYSE:SHI] and the China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC) [NYSE:CEO] signed a strategic agreement last week in an effort to rival the China National Petroleum Corp., indicating intensified competition in the Chinese energy market for control of gas resources, industry insiders told Interfax today.

The agreement between the traditional rivals seeks to expand natural gas reserves, build pipeline networks and secure gas supplies, Sinopec News, the official news portal of Asia's largest refiner, reported yesterday.




Though both Sinopec and CNOOC have stepped up gas exploration and made major discoveries in the past year, CNPC still controls about 70% of the country's gas resources and gas sales.

"The gas industry is a naturally monopolistic one that heavily depends on the availability of gas resources," an official with CNPC's natural gas distribution division, who wished to remain anonymous, said. "Sinopec and CNOOC's cooperation is clearly aimed at securing more stable gas supplies, but I don't think it will threaten CNPC as we are still very dominant in this regard."

The two companies' cooperation will be focused on the South China market, where Sinopec holds greater leverage over city gas pipelines and end users but lacks stable gas sources. Those gas sources could be complemented by CNOOC's liquefied natural gas import projects along the coast, especially in southern Guangdong Province, according to Sinopec sources cited in China Business News.

China's first LNG terminal in Guangdong's Shenzhen city, operated by CNOOC, went into operation last September, with planned annual imports of 3.85 million tonnes of LNG from Australia.

Sinopec plans to invest RMB 63.2 billion ($8.18 billion) in gas exploration at its major discovery in southwestern Sichuan Province, which it discovered last year, and on a pipeline to transmit the gas to the energy-hungry east coast. However, the pipeline will end in the metropolitan city of Shanghai, rather than the equally energy-thirsty Guangdong Province.

CNPC is also planning additional expansion of its gas supplies.

For example, it is seeking the buildup of an LNG terminal in northern Hebei Province and a pipeline to receive gas from Russia.

The widely publicized oilfield discovery in the Jidong block off the Bohai Bay by its listed company PetroChina [NYSE:PTR] contains gas reserves of 140.1 billion cubic metres.

The Chinese government forecasts domestic natural gas demand will reach 100 billion cubic metres a year by 2010, up from around 65 billion cubic metres in 2005, as the country is turning to the cleaner fuel amid robust economic growth.

© InterFax-China 2007. For more intelligence on Chinese metals and mining, click here or contact David Harman in Hong Kong at david.harman@interfax-news.com

Addax Petroleum "buy"

Wednesday, May 23, 2007 9:42:02 AM ET
UBS

NEW YORK, May 23 (newratings.com) - Analysts at UBS maintain their "buy" rating on Addax Petroleum (ticker: AXC.TO). The target price is set to C$51.

In a research note published this morning, the analysts mention that the company has posted unrisked resources amounting to 1.6 billion boe, including the oil resources of 1.3 billion bbls and the contingent gas resources of 1.4 Tcf. Addax Petroleum’s existing 2P reserves have the potential to double to 354 million bbls, since the company’s deep water blocks are likely to contain unrisked recoverable resources of 742 MMbbls, the analysts say. The company is still to release its resource assessment on the Kurdistan assets, which is expected to have a resource potential of net 204 million bbls, UBS adds.

Sao Tome Principe/EG targeted for base

Geopolitical Diary: AFRICOM and U.S. Military Priorities in Africa
May 23, 2007 02 00 GMT

The Nigerian militant group Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), which has shuttered one-third of Nigeria's oil output with attacks since December 2005, on Tuesday criticized the U.S. proposal to create a Pentagon command in Africa (AFRICOM). The statement comes shortly after the U.S. Energy Information Administration released data indicating Nigeria has become the third-largest supplier of U.S. oil, behind Canada and Mexico and ahead of Saudi Arabia.

The Pentagon's upcoming launch of AFRICOM reveals that U.S. activities in Africa are failing to fully protect U.S. interests there, namely energy -- meaning the Pentagon likely will open a command location in the Gulf of Guinea once AFRICOM gets under way.

AFRICOM, the Pentagon's newest combatant command station, is expected to be launched in September 2008 to combine U.S. defense activities in Africa under one roof. Until now, the Europe, Central and Pacific commands have held separate responsibilities for activities in Africa. The Pentagon has so far been divided on how to operate on the continent because, unlike in other theaters, it does not face a constant threat in Africa that requires a unified military presence there. Rather, the Pentagon has a number of competing priorities, including conducting counterterrorism, humanitarian, maritime and energy security operations to keep the ungoverned parts of the continent from becoming the next Afghanistan or Iraq.

AFRICOM will begin operations from a U.S. base in Stuttgart, Germany, but will relocate to Africa once a basing model is determined. The Pentagon has yet to decide whether AFRICOM will follow a single headquarters model or a multiple location, distributive model.

In the Horn of Africa region, the United States carries out counterterrorism operations from Camp Lemonier in Djibouti. The Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa command, which conducted airstrikes in early January against al Qaeda and Islamists in southern Somalia, falls under the Central Command's responsibility.

In the Sahel region of West Africa, U.S. concern for combating terrorism led the Pentagon in 2005 to launch the Trans-Saharan Counterterrorism Initiative (TSCI), which built on the previous Pan-Sahel Initiative. TSCI, which falls under the Europe Command, does not use a fixed base location. Rather, this initiative, which receives funding of $100 million per year, provides for joint military cooperation with countries bordering the largely ungoverned Sahara desert region.

While TSCI includes Nigeria, it does not include security for the country's oil-rich Niger Delta region. This issue is of particular concern in Nigeria, where the government has proved incapable of protecting Niger Delta oil infrastructure against attacks by militant groups, the best known of which is MEND. Since the group kicked off its December 2005 campaign to demand national political prominence, MEND attacks have cut Nigeria's oil output by a third.

AFRICOM's goal is to boost security cooperation in the region. While the United States is not expected to send troops into Nigeria to guard oil facilities or personnel, the Pentagon can be expected to work closely with the Nigerian government and military by providing training, advising and possibly weapons to improve their indigenous security capabilities. The United States previously engaged in military cooperation with Nigerian forces, training a battalion of Nigerian peacekeepers in 2000 perceived to have performed exceptionally during U.N. and West African peacekeeping missions in Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Adding the Gulf of Guinea region to the Pentagon's list of priorities for AFRICOM complicates the challenge of determining the command's location. With 2,500 miles from north to south and 2,500 miles from east to west -- as well as little reliable transportation infrastructure in between -- responding to crises in Africa's vastly disparate and troubled regions presents a tremendous logistical challenge. Therefore, AFRICOM is not likely to follow the single headquarters model; rather, it probably will use a distributive model with a series of lily pad bases. Even so, AFRICOM will still have to deal with logistics contingencies that cannot be solved by spreading bases out among a number of locations.

The Camp Lemonier base in Djibouti likely will be kept, as it is an excellent location from which to conduct counterterrorism operations in the Horn of Africa. Liberia, the closest U.S. ally to the Sahel region, could also be considered for a base from which to launch into the Sahel. Improving energy security cooperation in the Gulf of Guinea, however, will require its own nearby military presence -- and for that AFRICOM likely will focus on one of two locations: Sao Tome and Principe, or the Malabo archipelago of Equatorial Guinea.

Both are island territories that provide numerous advantages for military planners and the oil industry as they are essentially protected by water from land-based threats like MEND. Malabo has the benefit of being more closely located to the Niger Delta, while Sao Tome and Principe is located in the middle of the Gulf of Guinea subregion, roughly equidistant to Angola's oil fields to the south and the Niger Delta to the north. Lastly, particularly in the case of the Niger Delta, being located nearby yet offshore would reduce AFRICOM's visible and likely controversial presence.

While Pentagon planners have not yet determined how and where AFRICOM will be configured when it is set up in fall 2008, this much is certain: The current setup does not adequately serve U.S. interests. AFRICOM will be a different kind of command, with priorities other than conventional combat that relegate fighting further down the list, but being ready in the Gulf of Guinea will remain a high priority.

Emeka Offor mentioned in this recent article
Thr. 3rd May, 2007
2007 elections, free and fair - Ojo Maduekwe
By Biola Azeez


Ojo MaduekweNational Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Ojo Maduekwe, in this interview with Biola Azeez, speaks on the just-concluded general elections, describing them as free and fair. Excerpts:

There was a reported apathy on the election day of the National Assembly. What would you ascribe this to?
You know there was a traffic involving election in our kind of democratic system. There was a traffic on polling day. To ascertain voters’ turn out, one needs an aggregation of the entire traffic. Those who came at 10, 12, 2, 3, 4 pm. And for obvious democratic and bureaucratic logistic problems, which INEC has quite honestly admitted, this election has been free and fair as its own imperfection like any other election anywhere in the world. And one of those imperfections as we had it, voters do turn out and election officers and materials may not be there until several hours after.


One cannot say this is a low voters’ turnout just because the traffic around the polling booth is not much. They have to adjust themselves to the availability of materials. A lot of people, I understand had been waiting to know when the materials would be made available before deciding to come out and vote. It happened to me too. But farmers who had something doing at the farm after waiting for sometime due to lateness in arrival of materials, may go to the farm and vote later. It is the aggregation of that traffic that will determine if there was low turnout. My own assessment was that voters’ turnout had not been below average.


How do you react to the statement that INEC deliberately delayed materials meant for the South-east geo-political zone?
I don’t speak for INEC, but I always say there is need for us to protect democratic institutions. There is need for us to respect all the agencies. I think we should give INEC benefits of doubt. If there is improvement, we should appreciate that because INEC has learnt from mistakes of the last two elections. They meant well and therefore worked hard. They have succeeded in organising, for the first time in Nigeria , a breakthrough election from one civilian government to another. Even if they have failed in other areas, they deserve to be commended for it.


Some have called for total cancellation of the 2007 elections, saying it’s not a true reflection of the wishes of the people. What do you have to say to that?
There are two sets of politicians in Nigeria . Those who believe in democracy and those who do not believe in democracy. Those who believe in democracy know that only legal constitutional platform should be for legitimately pressing for cancellation of votes. Any call for cancellation of votes outside the constitution reflects the frustration of those who never believe in democracy in the first place. PDP was announced by INEC to have lost in my own state, the state of the national secretary of the party. There is no call for celebration though we won the presidency. Should I because PDP lost in my state declare state of emergency that everything should be cancelled? All my brothers in the same party from the state have accepted the result of the election as announced by INEC. The next place to make our demands is the tribunal. I have been in politics for 16 years. I’m personally devastated by what happened in my state. Whatever may be the reason it happened, we are not crying blue murder. What makes those complaining think that their own loss is more than mine?


The difference between PDP and other parties is that we believe in democracy. That is why we are not saying the painful results in Abia, Lagos , Kano , Bauchi and Borno etc are not wishes of the people. Those calling for cancellation are those who never believe in the democratic process. Even before election started, they had already started calling for an Interim National Government which is not provided in the constitution. Before the election started, they were already saying PDP had rigged it and so, election should be postponed. Those are lousy and terrible losers who don’t have the democratic spirit. The sooner Nigerians tell them they are bad advertisement for democracy, the better it is for democracy. If you believe in Nigeria, you must play by the rules of the game. And in this game, there are three levels of engagement. One is nomination within the party. Of course, they didn’t go through democratic process in their own party. Theirs is a party without capacity to win election anywhere. They should either go to tribunal if they have any demand or else, they will be inviting anarchy.


What is your reaction to the issue of Senator Araraume vis-a-vis Imo State governorship elections?
PDP is law-abiding and will always respect court orders and judgments especially if those judgments are final and conclusive. We will not under any circumstance disobey court no matter how painful its decision may be. There is no provision for independent candidate in our constitution; every candidate must come from a political party. Our position is that people of Imo State should vote for PDP. Ballot papers only have names of parties, even the pictures are not distinct. People are voting party logo and the party but not any candidates. That is democracy.


What do you see to the controversy over the Ohafia Asagha Trust Fund/Civic Centre in your home town home town in the last two years?
Hardly had the civic centre taken off from foundation that it dawned on the community that it was an impossible task. They had bitten more than they could chew. Unless a miracle happens, the project will not be completed. I asked them how much it would require to finish the building. They said N17 million and it was at a time the community had never raised up to N1 million in any launching or fund raising. Never.


The highest they ever raised was N500, 000. I just decided to put my goodwill at work since I don’t take money from contractors. So, I invited my friends to come to my community to contribute to development there. On the spot, not pledges, N70 million was raised. And because I wanted maximum transparency before even the fund raising, I had gotten the town union to approve the recommendation that a trust fund should be created to manage that money. It’s not to be managed by me or the town union who had no capacity for managing fund in the past.


It was trust fund of notable men from this community and outside the community. The big donors like Dangote, Emeka Offor who gave N10 million each were included in membership of the trust fund’s Board of Trustees. Of course, I was attacked for that. They said why didn’t I hand over the money to a town union that had never managed one million naira before. For two years I was fought.


They wrote petitions against me, they even accused me of stealing their money and reported me to the presidency. They stopped the registration of the trust fund for two years because they wanted the money to be given to them to be shared among them. I was so annoyed I nearly returned the money to the donors, for the matter to be over. I can’t spend the money by law, but I can return it to the donors. But President Olusegun Obasanjo said, “No, you must not do that.


When you are doing something good, many people will not want it to materialise”. I thank the president for that fatherly advice. If not for that advice and I returned the money to the donors, we will not have the civic centre and the on-going road construction in the community. Also, part of the money (#10 million) had been used to renovate a dilapidated school, out of the interest generated by the money. We lost a lot of money as we could not pursue the pledges made and for late opening of the bank account for the trust fund. To God be the glory, the civic centre will soon be completed, money is no longer the problem.

back

Nigeria delays oil exploration bloc auction
05.02.07, 8:17 AM ET


ABUJA (Thomson Financial) - Nigeria has delayed an auction of 45 oil exploration blocs from May 3 to May 11, Energy Minister Edmund Daukoru said.

Nigeria, the world's sixth largest oil exporter, regularly puts exploration fields up for auction to foreign and domestic bidders. This latest round has been postponed several times since late 2006.

Daukoru told oil operators and investors in Houston, in the US state of Texas, that the deadline for registration has been put back to May 5, Nigerian news agency NAN reported.

The minister assured his audience the electronic auction would be 'fair and transparent'.

Last month, Daukoru announced that a mixture of Niger basin, deep offshore and inland basin fields would be auctioned off. Production sharing agreements would be signed two weeks after the bidding round.

The new auction date of May 11 will take place before President Olusegun Obasanjo hands over power on May 29 to his successor Umar Yar'adua, who won contested elections last month.

Four bidders for Nigeria oil contract - Contractor General still probing Trafigura award
published: Wednesday | May 2, 2007


Ruth Potopsingh, group managing director of the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica (PCJ), says the PCJ board will have to sign off on the evaluations committee. - File

Lavern Clarke, Business Editor

Four oil traders have tendered for the lift and trading contract for the crude Jamaica buys from Nigeria, but evualations of the bids will take another month, according to the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica (PCJ).

Bids from Glencore Energy UK Limited, whose parent already owns bauxite assets here (Windalco and Kirkvine) BP Oil International, Shell Western Supply and Trading Limited and Trafigura Beheer BV (the company that had the contract since 2000) were opened Monday but are be evaluated by a specially-constituted committee.

Dr Ruth Potopsingh, PCJ group managing director, told Wednesday Business that she has put together a list of names for the evaluation committee, but refused to disclose them, saying the PCJ board was yet to approve it.

Potopsingh is among the nominated members, as well as representatives from the energy company's technical officer corps, the board, its external auditors PricewaterhouseCoopers and board of directors, as well as the Office of the Contractor- eneral.

"The Contractor General's office will be an observer on the committee," the PCJ boss said on Tuesday.

The Nigerian oil contract, prior to now, was rolled over annually after negotiations between PCJ and the London office of the Dutch company.

Investigation on-going

In October, Contractor General Greg Christie announced that he would be investigating the "circumstances of the contract award" after a non-related arrangement involving payment of approximately $31 million to a then minister of government, Collin Campbell, from Trafigura was made public.

"The investigation is ongoing," said Claudia Williams, communications officer.

Christie at the launch of the probe had presented industry, Technology and Energy minister, Phillip Paulwell, with a 16-point list of information and documentation required on the contract and how it was tendered, but Williams would not say whether the ministry had been forthcoming with the information, saying it would contravene the OCG's policy of not commenting on ongoing investi-gations.

Earnings

Jamaica earned US12.5 cents per barrel of oil lifted by Trafigura after December 2004 when the contract terms were renegotiated from a profit sharing arrangement.

In the prior four years, the profit share arrangement earned Jamaica approximately US8 cents per barrel lifted.

In the near six years of the Trafigura contract, the oil trader lifted and traded more than 34 million barrels of crude from Nigeria on Jamaica's behalf.

Chevron locks Nigeria oil in
02/05/2007 13:37

Lagos - US oil gaint Chevron has shut down 15 000 barrels per day of oil production in its facility in southern Nigeria following a militant attack, a company spokesperson said on Wednesday.
"We have shut down 15 000 bpd from Funiwa oilfield," the spokesperson told AFP.

The company said it took the action "to avoid any additional security or safety incidents" following Tuesday's attack on its floating storage vessel that supports the Funiwa oilfield offshore southern Bayelsa state.

Nigeria's most high profile armed group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend) claimed reponsibility for the attack in which six foreign oil workers were kidnapped - four Italians, an American and a Croatian. One Nigerian navy officer was killed in the attack.

Mend said it would release the hostages unconditionally on May 30, adding that the attack was meant to embarrass the government of outgoing President Olusegun Obasanjo, who steps down on May 29 after serving two terms.

"We promised to give the present Nigerian administration a shameful send-off. This attack is one in a series intended to embarrass the ... regime," a Mend spokesperson said in an e-mail on Tuesday.

Nigeria is the world's sixth-biggest oil exporter, with daily output of some 2.6 million barrels. Chevron, the country's third operator, accounts for 520 000 bpd.

In a separate incident on Monday evening in neighbouring Rivers state, the mother of the governor-elect Celestine Omehia was kidnapped by an unknown militant group but was released the following day.

The Niger Delta, a swathe of creeks and swamps and the size of Scotland, is home to Nigeria's multi-billion dollar oil and gas industry.

The region has seen a resurgence in violent attacks on oil firms and personnel over the past two years.

More than 100 foreign workers have been kidnapped, but later released, while scores of Nigerian security personnel have been killed by militant groups or armed gangsters.

Nigeria: The Corruption of Oil
BY Darren Foster


Members of the militant group, MEND (Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta), patrol the oil-rich region.

During three weeks in one of the most corrupt countries in the world, I managed to pay only one bribe, and that was to get the hell out. Sure, I had paid "area boys," as young Nigerian hoodlums are known, for "protection" and I gave a little cash to the Big Man of one slum because that was the price to "snap, snap," or film in his territory. But I never actually paid an official. Not that I wasn't asked.

The military and police operate a comical number of checkpoints on Nigerian roadways. And each one is an opportunity for them to collect.

"Happy Easter! Do you have a little something for us?" one policeman asked.

"Sorry, I gave away all my chocolate bunnies to your friends at the previous 15 roadblocks," I replied.

"Happy Easter! Do you have a little something for us?" one policeman asked. "Sorry, I gave away all my chocolate bunnies to your friends at the previous 15 roadblocks," I replied.But when I found myself about to be stuck in Lagos on the eve of national elections, I was more than ready to start greasing palms. I wasn't alone. Many Nigerians were looking to escape the predicted violence, and arriving at the airport -- five hours before my flight as advised -- I encountered a seemingly endless line of people clamoring to check in for the North American Airlines flight to New York. Rumors were circulating that people were getting bumped, and finding myself way at the back of the queue, I was looking like one of them.

Nigeria is the most difficult place I have ever worked. "If you can survive in Nigeria, you can survive anywhere," is a popular refrain among young Nigerians (and now at least one young American). I had gone to report on the growing unrest in the country's oil-producing region, the Niger Delta, and in the process I had been intimidated by thugs, harassed by police, and extorted for payment nearly every time I took out my camera to film. Tellingly, the most relaxing part of my trip was an afternoon spent in the delta creeks with dozens of young men who were armed to the teeth and stoking a rebellion.


Despite its oil reserves, the delta remains one of the poorest and underserved regions in Nigeria. Most live on $1 or less a day and are without power, potable water and other basic services.

In short, I felt like I'd been bodyslammed and the thought of spending another minute, let alone election weekend in an increasingly fragile country was not, well, it just wasn't happening. So when a security official offered to usher me to the front of the line for a price, I readily agreed.

A little negotiating and $20 later, I was checked in. My final memory of Nigeria is of passing through airport security. After sending my camera bag through the X-ray machine, one of the guards asked, "Journalist?"

"Yes," I hesitated.

"Report something good about Nigeria," he said.

I hate to disappoint him and the dozens of Nigerians I met who are acutely aware that 419 active scams and top ranking on Transparency International's annual list of the world's most corrupt countries, have left their nation with an image problem. But as this past week's elections demonstrated, there is perhaps no sugar sweet enough to coat the violence and swindling that pervade Nigerian politics.

As this past week's elections demonstrated, there is perhaps no sugar sweet enough to coat the violence and swindling that pervade Nigerian politics.Marking the first time that one civilian government was to hand power to another, the elections in Africa's most populous country could have served as an example of the democratic process for the rest of the continent. Instead, election observers told the BBC that it "fell below even regional standards." Nigerians were treated to the same intimidation and ballot-box rigging that plagued voting in 1999 and 2003, the only two previous elections since the end of Nigeria's military dictatorship.

Out-going President Olusegun Obasanjo, whose party's presidential candidate Umaru Yar'Adua won more than 70 percent of the vote, chalked-up the election "charade" (as monitors called it) to the foibles of a developing African nation. ("We should not be measured by European standards," the president was recently quoted as saying.)

But apparently not all Nigerians share that view.

"Am glad to know you are back in the U.S. and safe. The elections are a fraud. So sad," a Nigerian friend emailed me last week.

Indeed, Nigerians have seen all this before, and according to Isaac Osuoka, director of Social Action Nigeria, "People are losing patience."

I met Osuoka in the Niger Delta, a place where you can say many have already run out of patience. In the past year, a growing and increasingly organized insurgency has kidnapped more than 100 foreign oil workers and attacked dozens of oil pipelines and facilities. In the world's eighth largest oil producer -- and the fifth largest supplier to the United States -- production has already been cut by 500,000 barrels a day, spelling billions of dollars in lost revenues for Nigeria and higher oil prices for the rest of us.


Oil spills have caused extensive environmental damage throughout the delta. Communities blame it on aging equipment and a lack of regulations. Oil companies say that many spills are caused by saboteurs.

According to Osuoka, failed elections will only further destabilize the region.

"People are fed up with the impoverishment, the loss of livelihoods, the human rights abuses, with the contempt of the government and with the rigging of elections," he said. "They want to fight back."

The Niger Delta is a place of fantastic contrasts and corruption. Despite producing tens of billions of dollars worth of oil every year -- and 80 percent of the country's revenue -- the delta remains one of the poorest and underserved regions in Nigeria. Most live on $1 or less a day and are without power, potable water and other basic services.

"People always talk about Africa in connection with poverty, but I tell people all the time, 'Don't count my country as one of them,'" said Ibiba Don Pedro, a Nigerian journalist who has been covering the Delta for more than a decade. "Nigeria is blessed with natural resources. Oil is the resource that drives the modern world. But it's not translated into anything meaningful for the vast majority of Nigerian people."

A major reason why $400 billion in oil revenue over the last four decades hasn't translated into anything meaningful is simply corruption. Since independence, leaders have stolen or wasted more than $380 billion, according to Nuhu Ribadu, chairman of Nigeria's Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. The EFCC has opened investigations on 31 of Nigeria's 36 governors, including the governor of Nigeria's oil capital Rivers State, who is accused of stealing almost $1 billion.

A major reason why $400 billion in oil revenue over the last four decades hasn't translated into anything meaningful is simply corruption. Since independence, leaders have stolen or wasted more than $380 billion.Of course, what all of this squandering of oil funds and wholesale neglect has created is growing unrest.

"We are fighting for ultimate control of our resources," Jomo Gbomo, the self-professed leader and spokesman of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), wrote to me in an email. "I believe that the situation will soon descend into a full-blown war that will last many years."

MEND is an amalgam of numerous militant groups operating in the delta. Just how united they are under MEND's umbrella is unclear. But they do enjoy popular support.

Through a local contact, I arranged to meet with a group claiming to be part of MEND.

"There will be no police or military around. You'll be safe," my contact said.

When I arrived at the designated meeting point, a small port on the creeks, a group of young boys approached my car.

"Oyibo (white man), the men are waiting for you," one said politely. "Follow me."

I had the impression that this was all going to be very clandestine, so I was amazed when I followed the boy to the dock and saw that smack in the middle of the daily activity of trade and transport there were half a dozen young men holding AK-47s and machine guns with bullet belts draped Rambo-style across their shoulders.

They were unmasked and intensely serious. But except for me, everyone else seemed completely at ease. I boarded a 20-foot craft with a small cabin at the front and twin 85 horsepower engines at the back, serious muscle in a region where most people get around in dugout canoes.

On the hour-plus ride through the creeks to the group's camp, we passed several communities built on stilts. Villagers came out and waved to the militants; some bowed.On the hour-plus ride through the creeks to the group's camp, we passed several communities built on stilts. Villagers came out and waved to the militants; some bowed. And the driver slowed to reduce our wake every time we passed an over-laden canoe. It was all very neighborly.

Before entering the camp, I was sprinkled three times with a milky-like substance -- to cleanse me of bad spirits, I was told. Then, I was brought to the center of a large communal area where in addition to couple dozen more armed men, there were management types dressed in slacks and button-down shirts with cellphone headsets dangling from their ears.

The spokesman for the group, who went by the name Zima, introduced me to the group's leader, General Shoot At Sight. I hoped it was nothing more than a colorful nom de guerre and not a nickname he had actually earned.

After introducing myself, I was taken around to some of the local villages to see "what we are fighting for." It was the same litany of offenses I had seen on other tours around the delta, crumbling schools, no roads, no health facilities, and so on. The tour ended with four boatloads of heavily armed men racing around me in circles to demonstrate their power.

"We have decided to form a formidable body to fight for our development," Zima said.

And like many other people I met in the delta, Zima felt that an armed struggle was the logical next step after all other means had failed.

"The generation before tried to approach the government to do something positive to change their lives," he said. "They tried to adopt peaceful resolution, but the federal government designed special strategies to combat us with their forces, so we decided to resort to this type of measure."

The militants may not have been as savvy as some of the long-time activists I met in other parts of the delta -- Zima kept on referring to nearby oil rigs in the "Pacific Ocean" -- but they carry a great equalizer...their weapons.The militants may not have been as savvy as some of the long-time activists I met in other parts of the delta -- Zima kept on referring to nearby oil rigs in the "Pacific Ocean" -- but they carry a great equalizer...their weapons.

"It is not difficult to imagine with the level of arms and ammunitions that we have seen with these militants that this will develop into a full-fledged rebellion," Osuoka, the human rights activist, said.

"People do not have any hope in the ability to change the electoral process or to bring about the desired political changes. And they're supporting alternative measures, including massive support for militant groups."

And that's what it's come down to in Nigeria; where elections are corrupt, and violence is escalating, it's catch-as-catch-can, and everyone else is running for the exits.

Nigerian militants attack Chevron oil vessel, kidnapping 6 foreigners and killing sailor

By Katharine Houreld
ASSOCIATED PRESS

1:51 p.m. May 1, 2007

LAGOS, Nigeria – Gunmen armed with dynamite assaulted a Chevron Corp. tanker in Nigeria's southern oil-producing region early Tuesday, killing a Nigerian sailor and kidnapping an American oil worker and five other foreigners, authorities said.
The restive region's main militant group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, claimed responsibility for the attack.



AdvertisementNavy Capt. Obiora Medani said the sailor was a guard aboard the tanker FPSO Oloibiri, which was in waters off Bayelsa state.
Chevron said it shut down a station pumping oil to the ship, cutting its daily production by 15,000 barrels.

Tope Idowu, a spokesman for the California-based company, said the gunmen kidnapped an American, four Italians and one Croatian. He said the American worked for Chevron in Nigeria while the rest were employees of a subsidiary, Chevron Shipping Co.

No demands had been made by the attackers, Idowu added.

The claim of responsibility was sent from an e-mail address used by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta. It said the attack was to demonstrate the group's continued strength as the West African nation ushers in a new government after recent elections.

“We will continue with our struggle for justice until we achieve all our goals without exception,” the group said.

The group promised to release the hostages May 30 as long as there was no attempt to free them – such as offering a ransom. It previously has demanded the release of two leaders imprisoned by the government on treason and corruption charges and it wants the Niger Delta's people to have greater control over the region's oil wealth.

While the country's oil exports generate tens of billions of dollars in revenue annually, most Nigerians live in poverty. Extensive corruption leaves social services largely nonexistent.

In a separate incident, gunmen released the mother of a prominent Nigerian politician, a day after she was kidnapped from her home, police said.

Police Commissioner Felix Ogbadu said the mother of the newly elected governor of Rivers state, Celestine Omeiha, was in good health and had been reunited with her son. Ogbadu said it was not clear who her kidnappers were. There had not been any demands for her release.

Kidnapping foreign workers is common in the lawless southern region. Some abductors make political demands and others demand large ransoms, but they usually release the hostages unharmed. The groups enjoy protection from local politicians, who are suspected of using them as thugs.

Art2004/Badog, I've also never read a message board where the readers pay so little attention to the thread. Why don't both of you go back to the start of this thread? Then maybe you'll know what you're talking about.

I posted an article about Andrew Young. So there's no speculative idea from a poster.......... I just posted an article about Andrew Young, as in Andrew Young of Goodworks International....... the article talks about how Goodworks is just ripping off the Nigerians....... so what's the ERHC connection? Howard Jeter, ERHC Board Member, who use to be Executive VP for Goodworks International..........

ND9

dbernet, if you go back and look at my posts, you'll see that I mainly just post articles. Most of the time, with no commentary. It's up to the reader to decide what to believe. I don't really post based on what web site I find the information........ I just find the articles and post them........ I just post them to share information and also, so folks will think about them and maybe share their thoughts with me. It's that simple.

ND9

US Policy Towards Gulf of Guinea. Page 3 states estimate of 6-12 Billion Barrels in JDZ.......

Here's one article and there are lots more.........

http://library.fes.de/pdf-files/iez/02115/valle.pdf


ND9

Bsk2007 - I've seen a few different articles estimating between 6 and 12 Billion barrels of oil in the JDZ. Are you saying all those articles are wrong?

ND9