afrol News, 20 June - West Africans complaining about deteriorating quality of gasoline marketed in their country have proven to be right. A network to export illegal poor quality fuel into West Africa, headed by Trafigura, the company behind the toxic scandal in Côte d'Ivoire, is being exposed in Europe.
A chemical tank explosion in a remote Norwegian fiord; a dubious refinery in Estonia without imports and exports; the intoxication of shipping inspectors in the Netherlands; the great toxic scandal in Côte d'Ivoire; and rising frustration and protests among car owners all over West Africa - all tracks lead back to the Dutch-registered giant shipping company Trafigura.
In late February this year, a strike among Cameroonian taxi drivers caused mass protests against hiking fuel prices and deteriorating gasoline quality. At least 24 protestors were killed by government forces, and hundreds of others were arrested during the ensuing crackdown.
Yaoundé taxi driver John Gwat told reporter Vivienne Walt the riots were a fitting reaction. He believes that along with the rise in prices, the quality of fuel at many gas pumps has plummeted. "Our fuel is not fine," he says. "They have started to mix in kerosene. It damages the engines."
These allegations are strongly denied by oil companies, gasoline stations and authorities in Cameroon. But they are becoming more and more accepted by the Cameroonian public. Worse yet, drivers in most of West Africa complain about gasoline damaging their vehicles.
A documentary by the Norwegian state broadcaster 'NRK' aired yesterday proves West African consumers are right. An entire cynical industry has developed to produce dangerous low octane gasoline with very high sulphur values from waste products, smuggling it through European facilities, shipping it in great tankers to West Africa, where shipments are brought ashore by smaller vessels, bribing local inspectors to accept illegal fuel standards.
The scheme was discovered after investigations into last year's explosion of tank facilities owned by the local company Vest Tank in Western Norway. The explosion caused similar health affects on locals as the toxic scandal in Côte d'Ivoire, and it soon turned out a sister ship to "Probo Koala" - the Trafigura vessel causing the Ivorian toxic disaster - and several other Trafigura vessels had trafficked Vest Tank's facilities.
Coast and custom authorities only had been advised that Trafigura's vessels carried oil-contaminated wastewater that was to be deposited at Vest Tank. However, their real carriage was so-called coker gasoline, which is a waste product from oil refining, usually disposed of. The product originated from US oil production in the Gulf of Mexico, known to have high sulphur values.
Secretly, and without government permission, Vest Tank added water and caustic soda (sodium hydroxide) to this waste product, resulting in a new chemical mix closer to a fuel product. From Norway, Trafigura vessels transported this toxic product to a refinery it controls in Paldiski, Estonia, again without the knowledge of Estonian authorities. Here, another chemical process heightened the octane grading of the "fuel".
The new product, legally a waste product that would have needed a special export licence from Europe, now was shipped directly to West Africa on the same giant vessels. According to official papers, they were carrying only legal wastewater and their destination, leaving Estonia, was yet undecided. During a stopover in the Netherlands on one trip, however, a shipping inspector got injured by the high sulphur gradient in the chemical mix the vessel carried.
The "fuel", based on popped-up coker gasoline, has a low octane grade and very high sulphur values. It is very far from legal standards of gasoline products in Europe and the US, and in most cases also outside legal standards in West Africa, which are laxer on sulphur. In most cases, such products can harm engines and will harm the environment and human health. Products with such poor quality have been delivered West Africa that the "fuel" could not be exposed to sunlight without decomposing.
Upon arrival in the Gulf of Guinea, the giant Trafigura vessels anchor up off the coast to handle pre-arranged deals with local traders. Smaller vessels transport the fuel onshore. In the 'NRK' documentary, sales to Côte d'Ivoire, Togo and Cameroon were especially mentioned.
In an interview with 'NRK', Dutch citizen Arend van Campen told how he managed to bring poor fuels onshore in West Africa when earlier working as the representative of the supplier onboard Trafigura vessels. If authorities take samples and find that qualities are not according to specifications, the representative "would be able to hopefully convince them to accept the cargo anyway .. by making them change their mind," Mr van Campen said. He claimed never to have bribed any West African inspector, but said this could happen on such transports.
The extension of this speculative trade is yet to be exposed. Only the limited investigations made by 'NRK' revealed a total of 150,000 tonnes of coker gasoline passing through Norway's Vest Tank on route to West Africa during a seven-month period. Trafigura is now trying to buy the ruins of Vest Tank to carry on with its lucrative trade in gasoline to West Africa.
Meanwhile, it is suspected that the explosive mixing of coker gasoline with caustic soda and water is done onboard the tanker vessels, despite high environmental risks at sea. Also, it is expected that several other supply chains exist to this lucrative trade.
Trafigura, for its sake, claims it is victim to "defamation" following the documentary. In a written statement, the Dutch company points out that it "does not engage in illegal operations and requires that its subcontractors and chartered vessels do not do so either," adding that it still remains to be proven the company has any responsibility for the Côte d'Ivoire toxic disaster.
Regarding the poor quality of gasoline delivered to West Africa, as documented by 'NRK', Trafigura spokesman Neil Cameron comments that "all leading global oil traders prepare different gasoline specifications to suit the needs of different markets around the world," thus there should not be any special media focus on Trafigura. Allegations of misconduct "in relation to imports of gasoline into West Africa" were "utterly without foundation," Mr Cameron added.
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