Business

Violence in oil industry
by Romana Schlesingerova

Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta claimed responsibility to the attack from November 15th 2007. Attackers blew up a crude oil pipeline on Thursday, after a month full of violence against Africa`s top oil producer. "We will continue to nibble on the oil industry until they feel the pains," said the group of militants known as MEND. The results of its action caused major problems in the industry. Nigeria- a former source of corruption and national shame Years before the violence started in the Delta, the oil business had been a mess. Changing military leaders and governments found this to be a source of their personal account and spent more money supporting lucrative contracts than investing in refineries. It looked like nobody succeeded to understand that some acts will be sooner or later followed by results. Those are now alarming and way beyond the national Nigeria's politics. Oil prices rising above Crude prices have been erratic this week, falling more than $3 on Tuesday and rising more than $2 on Wednesday after hitting a record of $98.62 a barrel last week. Shell declined to specify the volume of production affected, but an industry source estimated it between 20,000 and 50,000 barrels per day. Other major exporters as Nymex, Petromatrix and others followed. "The federal government is not serious about the whole thing. We have been saying this for weeks and now everything is going out of control," said Jonjon Oyeinfie, a delta activist. The oil industry creates 76% of government revenues and Nigeria is existentially dependent on it. The new government is taking all kinds of actions to rebuild the corrupted business into a modern and functioned company. However, this will not work without securing the pipelines against another wave of violence.

related story: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071116/ap_on_bi_ge/oil_prices;_ylt=AvuxdhfeqJud5nAE2jo4lris0NUE

by Romana Schlesingerova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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posted by Blog TechSource @ 12:15 PM