Africa News blog

Angola throws back punches

Tired of being criticised for being one of the world’s most secretive governments, Angola is finally throwing back some punches. Top government officials, including the economy minister, the finance minister and the head of the central bank, held a news conference late on Friday to discuss the government’s first 200 days in power — the second news conference of the kind this year. “You thought we wouldn’t do this again,” said Carlos Feijo, Angola’s powerful minister of state who is seen by many as the president’s right-hand man. “Well, here we are.” He then went on to speak non-stop for 40 minutes, describing how the economy had improved in recent months, plans to pay billions in debt to construction firms and the fight against poverty and corruption before opening up the floor to questions. Many journalists praised the government’s decision to hold the news conference as a step in the right direction in a nation where officials seem to be paid to keep quiet and where people are afraid to openly criticise the president. Greater transparency could also bolster Angola’s chances of receiving more Western loans and placing debt with private investors abroad, as it seeks cash shore up its finances after the recent slump in oil prices. Angola was ranked in the bottom 19 of 180 countries in a Transparency International corruption study last year. State-run daily Jornal de Angola hailed the news conference a success in an editorial a few days later. “The Angolan government has explained how public funds are being managed so that Angolans continue to trust in those they elected into government for four years,” said Jornal de Angola. “It is important that all Angolans, whether or not they voted for the ruling party, to be aware of the importance of this extraordinary performance.” The question is whether the Angolan government is serious about increasing transparency or simply using the media’s thirst for information to campaign ahead of the nation’s 2012 elections.

Breaking down the walls – Sudan’s oil transparency push

It was a just another seminar on transparency in the oil sector. Seemingly banal.

But this was being held in Khartoum, involving live debates between northern and southern Sudanese officials, a minerals watchdog and the international media, who were allowed free access to publicly grill those who administer what has for years been an incredibly opaque oil industry.

What emerged was surprisingly positive and all walked away feeling that — at least until the Jan. 9, 2011 referendum on southern independence — this was the first step towards finally unpicking all the stitches that have sewn the sector tightly shut to outsiders.

We are “PR stupid” said the newly appointed Minister for Energy from the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, Lual Deng, who instigated the forum.

He said this to explain the discrepancies in oil production and oil prices uncovered by Global Witness, a non-governmental organisation, whose report “Fuelling Mistrust — the need for transparency in Sudan’s oil sector” provoked the discussion.

These discrepancies include oil prices published by the ministry of finance web site with little clarification of how they had been calculated, even citing barrels of Sudanese oil selling for as little as 15 cents a barrel.

Global Witness also found discrepancies between China’s CNPC, which dominates a Sudanese oil sector dogged by U.S. sanctions, and Sudan’s energy ministry output figures. Those figures were easily explained as the difference between gross production and net of water, gas and solids on Wednesday.

Buy on the Nigeria rumour, sell on the Niger fact

Confusion over the names of two similar-sounding African countries may have helped boosted oil prices to near $80 a barrel this week as traders rushed to buy oil after reports of a military coup.

A Reuters reporter received a flustered phone call from a hedge fund partner who had heard animated discussion in the market about an incident in Nigeria, only to realise that traders had muddled up Africa’s biggest oil producer with its neighbour Niger.

“Markets took off at around the same time a Reuters story came out about gunfire erupting in the Niger capital in an apparent coup bid, mistaken by many as being Nigeria,” said Tom Bentz, analyst at BNP Paribas Commodities.

Reuters first broke news of heavy gunfire and a coup in Niger’s capital, Niamey, on Thursday. Prices jumped to a one-month high of $79.29 a barrel during the day.

While a coup in Nigeria would almost certainly rock crude oil benchmarks, a coup in Niger  — which has yet to produce oil — would almost certainly not, barring linguistic confusion.

Traders said that an oil market version of the game “Chinese whispers” rather than poor geography may have been behind the jump, as some scrambled to call the market amid mounting confusion over the titles of the two countries which share the same first five letters. The fact that Nigeria’s main oil producing region is called the Niger Delta and is an area of political unrest probably also stoked the rumours. A popular trading mantra is “buy the rumour, sell the fact”.

But far from being a costly mistake, the decision to buy oil on the Niger coup was a flash of fortuitous genius for some as oil prices continued rising afterwards to within cents of $80 a barrel on Thursday, spurred by other factors such as tension over Iran’s nuclear programme and a weaker dollar.

How has the G8 delivered on its Africa Action Plan?

This week’s G8 summit in Japan marks 6 years since the group of the world’s top industrial nations adopted a comprehensive action plan to support initiatives to spur the development of Africa. The G8 Africa Action Plan adopted at a summit in Kananaskis, Canada, in 2002 was seen as the biggest boost to Africa’s own home-grown development initiative, the New Partnership for Africa’s Development, NEPAD. The G8 Plan pledges to help Africa tackle the main obstacles to its development — from promoting peace and security, to boosting trade and implementing debt relief to expanding education, health facilities and fighting HIV/AIDS.

As a followup to the Action Plan, the G8 at its 2005 summit in Scotland agreed to double aid by 2010 to $50 billion, half of which would go to Africa. But as G8 leaders prepared  for this year’s summit in Japan, the Africa Progress Panel set up to monitor implementation of the 2005 commitments issued a gloomy report last month. It said under current spending the G8 would fall $40 billion short of its target. Other aid agency officials accused the G8 of backtracking on its pledges to Africa.

But some analysts argue that agreements reached at the 2005 summit were just a part of the G8 Africa Action Plan which offers a far more comprehensive framework for dealing with the continent’s problems. Britain under Prime Minister Tony Blair played a leading role in placing Africa’s problems at the top of the G8 agenda. The UK progress report details London’s implementation of the G8 Action Plan including its role as lead international partner in Sierra Leone after helping to end civil war in the former colony in 2002. US President George W. Bush has won praise in Africa for commiting more of the administrations’s resources to Africa’s war against HIV/AIDS.

But overall, has the G8 kept faith with Africa in the implementation of the Africa Action Plan? How have the decisions of the G8 helped your country or your personal life? Has NEPAD shown enough capacity to keep the G8 focused on its pledges? Is the G8 likely to switch its focus from Africa to more pressing global issues like soaring oil prices and the threat of inflation and recession in its own member countries? Have your say.