Chad & Cameroon
Conservationists sceptical about watchdog for Chad-Cameroon pipeline

Misanet.com / IPS, 2 March - The World Bank is appointing a special committee to oversee a controversial oil pipeline project in Chad and Cameroon, in response to critics who warn that the project will harm rainforests and may worsen an already violent human rights situation. Not enough, repeat environmentalists, calling for a moratorium on the construction of the pipeline.

While pipeline critics said the appointment of the advisory group represents a step toward greater transparency in how the project develops, they remained sceptical about the effectiveness of the committee. 

The 3.7 billion dollar project will develop oil fields in land locked Chad and construct a 1,100 kilometre pipeline that will traverse tropical rain forests in order to reach an export facility on Cameroon's Atlantic coast. 

The World Bank Group approved a programme last June that will provide 365 million dollars in financing for the scheme to the governments of Chad and Cameroon and to the oil consortium building the project led by the US companies, ExxonMobil and Chevron.

Last week the Bank appointed an International Advisory Group that the institution says will be responsible for identifying potential problems in the use of public revenues, the adequacy of civil society participation, as well as environmental management and social impacts.

According to a statement released by the Bank, the purpose of the group is "to advise the World Bank Group and the governments of Chad and Cameroon with respect to observations about overall progress in implementation of the projects and in achievement of their social, environmental and poverty alleviation objectives."

The independent committee will be headed by the former Prime Minister of Senegal, Mamadou Lamine Loum. The Bank says the six-member committee will visit Chad and Cameroon at least twice a year and report periodically to the Bank's President and Board of Directors. The work of the advisory group is expected to continue for up to 10 years.

Emilie Thenard, an associate at the Center for International Environmental Law says the committee's charter contains potentially harmful loopholes and omissions. "This project has been plagued from the start with transparency, environmental, and corruption problems, and is desperately in need of an oversight committee that will aggressively promote community interests and needs," says Thenard. "It's not yet clear that the International Advisory Group will play this role."

She questions how closely the group will be able to monitor the project if it has no permanent posting in the pipeline region and on-site visits are scheduled only twice each year. The relationship between the committee and the oil companies is also unclear, Thenard argues, making access to critical information from the oil companies uncertain.

Critics are also concerned that the terms of reference appointing the international committee do not include watching out for human rights violations. "To us, it is unclear what this IAG will actually be monitoring," says Samuel Nguiffo at the Centre for Environment and Development based in Cameroon. "There is no mention at all how the members of the group will actually communicate with the local people affected by this project," he says.

A coalition of organisations opposed to the project are currently preparing a formal detailed response to present to the advisory group the week of Mar. 13, when committee members are expected to come to Washington, DC.

The Bank has long argued that despite the criticisms, the project will bring much needed foreign income to Chad, where oil was discovered 30 years ago. But recent reports that Chad's president spent 4.5 million dollars of the World Bank's loan on weapons instead of addressing poverty alleviation as promised, has fuelled opposition to the project.

Environmental and human rights organisations have called for a moratorium on the construction of the pipeline, saying that the project will not only harm fragile rainforests in Cameroon, but may also bolster the power of Chad, a country widely criticised for human rights abuses and corruption.

Critics say the project will affect hundreds of Bagyeli people living around the area. The southern portion of the pipeline will cut across Cameroon's tropical rainforest, home to these indigenous people popularly known as Pygmies.

While World Bank officials say nearby communities have been adequately consulted about the project, according to the Chadian Association for the Defense and Promotion of Human Rights, locals have been threatened if they speak out against the project.

Environmentalists say the potential for leaks and spills threatens farmland in Chad and Cameroon's main river systems and coastal fishing resources. The extinction of wildlife - including gorillas, chimpanzees, and elephants - already disappearing from Cameroon's forests as a result of commercial logging and poaching will be made easier by newly constructed access roads along the pipeline, say conservation groups.

By Danielle Knight, IPS 

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