Have they gone too far?

Right, this is my first post on this blog page. It is my desire to write and post summaries about books, articles, journals, poems or whatever I read on this page. I have called it the scholar's corner. This is an avenue to generate healthy arguments that would foster new knowledge and open a third eye on our fore heads as we view events in the world. Guess that introduction does it.

Ok.

I stumbled on this article, "A New Scramble for African Oil? Historical, and Business Perspectives" by Jedrzej. G. I & Mangel P.

The research reveals the plots and schemes some nations of the world use to filch the natural resources of various African states. The nations notorious for these acts, according to the authors, are the United States, China and Britain.

There are some staggering statics provided by these scholars and I would state them here briefly just to spark some thoughts in your head:

-In 2004, 28.7% of Chinese crude oil imports already are derived [mainly] from Africa.
- 800 Chinese companies are reportedly operating in 49 African countries, and Chinese trade with Africa was said to surpass $50 billion in 2006.
-US direct investment to sub-Saharan Africa in 2004 amounted to 40.1 billion in oil imports; in 2005 it amounted to 79.8% of all the purchases in the continent.
-Africa's oil import to the United States have been steadily rising and already account for some 20% of total US imports.

And here comes the truth that has always stared at us daily:

-Africa is important to the US because they [Africa] produces high-quality low-sulphur oil that is highly valued by the US market.   
           Indeed, there are other countries who intend to rape or loot the riches of the motherland. They are Malaysia, South Korea, Brazil, and India. It was argued that these countries look for ways to strike bi-lateral trade deals with these African countries in order to penetrate the economy of "oil coutries.".
          Statistics shows that the highest number of oil producing countries in Africa is Nigeria followed by Angola and Libya. Spoils from petrol sales, paradoxically, have not or does not reflect on the country. The case is similar to other oil producing African states. This has been blamed solely on bad leadership.
      There is also a malicious rivalry between America and China as to who fetches more from the oil wells in Africa. This has lead to competition between these countries. To get some oil they [those countries] "provide loans, debt relief, scholarships, training, and provision of military hardware without political or economic conditions" . In 2006, China's president, Jintao secured four oil licences from Nigeria in a deal worth $4 billion in investment. Ok, fine!

The questions are;
*How do we use the moneys gathered from this companies?
*Who do we hold responsible for the "missing" wealth of oil?
*If there was no oil would these nations be interested in African nations, would there be anything like debt relief, training etc.?

The essay concludes that the "New- Scramble" by these nations should be treated with caution and that, ordinary citizens would never benefit oil wealth if appropriate measures are not taken to check the stakeholders of this oil game.  These moves made by these nations was compared  to the 1884 Berlin conference where some European countries gathered to divide the continent as well as share the wealth.
Here is the link for further reading: http://afraf.oxfordjournals.org/content/106/423/229.full.pdf+html