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By Andrew Newton on 25 May, 2009 - 10:20 UTC
Nigeria's Business Day runs through the repercussions for Halliburton and other multinationals of ongoing legal actions over bribery schemes.
The investigation, which combines separate investigations in the US, France, UK and Nigeria, sets a precedent which, Business Day argues, should disincentivize foreign companies from such high level corruption in the future.
The report analyzes the potential implications of the investigation for former US vice president Dick Cheney, Royal Dutch Shell, and France's Technip.
Reading: Burma Junta Gas Profits Kept in Singapore Banks: ERI
By Andrew Newton on 12 Sep, 2009 - 14:23 UTC
Nigeria: Gas gets to flare another day
By Andrew Newton on 16 Mar, 2009 - 10:31 UTC
The Nigerian government has once again extended the deadline by which oil companies must end gas flaring.
Now the government is permitting the highly polluting flaring of natural gas to continue until 2011. There have been calls for an end to the practice since 1969.
Environmental Rights Action/ Friends of the Earth, Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) dismissed the planned extension of the deadline as being scripted by the oil copanies themselves. Successive Nigerian governments have demonstrably shown little commitment to ending the practice, despite horrendous envrironmental degradation and now increasing militancy within the Delta region which hosts most oil production.
Now the government is permitting the highly polluting flaring of natural gas to continue until 2011. There have been calls for an end to the practice since 1969.
Environmental Rights Action/ Friends of the Earth, Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) dismissed the planned extension of the deadline as being scripted by the oil copanies themselves. Successive Nigerian governments have demonstrably shown little commitment to ending the practice, despite horrendous envrironmental degradation and now increasing militancy within the Delta region which hosts most oil production.
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Despite record profits, Total cuts French jobs
By A P Newton on 13 Mar, 2009 - 12:47 UTC
France is protesting oil giant Total's planned cut of some 500 jobs in the wake of record profits in 2008.
Expatica: "Three hundred jobs are to go in Total's petrochemical arm and around 250 in its refineries, union officials were told at a specially convened meeting with management.
Philippe Goebel, managing director of Total Petrochemicals France, told AFP the posts would go at the subsidiary's French plants, offices and research centres.
He said the job cuts were a result of overcapacity in world petrochemical production and promised that the firm would create 100 new jobs in a partnership deal with GDF-Suez to produce solar panels.
Goebel insisted that there would be no compulsory redundancies and most would be through retirements.
But, coming less than a month after the Total parent company said it had made a French record profit of EUR 13.9 billion in 2008, the announcement angered both the government and unions."
Of course no French layoff announcement would be complete without a vigorous protest, which duly proceeded: "Workers at Total's Gonfreville l'Orcher refinery on France's north coast held a protest outside the plant after the job cuts were announced."
Expatica: "Three hundred jobs are to go in Total's petrochemical arm and around 250 in its refineries, union officials were told at a specially convened meeting with management.
Philippe Goebel, managing director of Total Petrochemicals France, told AFP the posts would go at the subsidiary's French plants, offices and research centres.
He said the job cuts were a result of overcapacity in world petrochemical production and promised that the firm would create 100 new jobs in a partnership deal with GDF-Suez to produce solar panels.
Goebel insisted that there would be no compulsory redundancies and most would be through retirements.
But, coming less than a month after the Total parent company said it had made a French record profit of EUR 13.9 billion in 2008, the announcement angered both the government and unions."
Of course no French layoff announcement would be complete without a vigorous protest, which duly proceeded: "Workers at Total's Gonfreville l'Orcher refinery on France's north coast held a protest outside the plant after the job cuts were announced."
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