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The boundaries of discord

By on March 31, 2010
The African underground is fuelling conflicts between States, and mainly over cross-border deposits. Arbitration has become very risky because the economic stakes are often enormous. Over the coming ten to twenty years, it is about 500 billion dollars that are in balance. It is a huge treasure of black gold in play, valued at 7 billion barrels buried in the African underground that many countries are competing about.

These deposits of discord are spread within 175 km of land borders, and over some blurred and challenged maritime boundaries. The will to diversify energy supply manifested by Westerners and Asians since 2001 has revived interest in the neglected African old oilfields.  Then the Great Lakes region, by the Gulf of Guinea has become a major battleground for the conquest and the distribution of these new markets. Tomorrow, probably, the Indian Ocean within a triangle drawn between the Comoros, Madagascar and Mozambique, will be another area of turbulence. “This responds to the legitimate desire of African States, favorably repositioned on the world oil map, to best exploit and enjoy these resource revenues, but how much it will cost to the stability of this already hottest area of Africa…

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