Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, Mozambique, Namibia, Senegal, Mauritania, Ivory Coast… Around ten African countries are preparing or have just joined the club of oil and gas exporters. At the beginning of March, Senegal, where a large gas deposit was discovered in recent years on the border with Mauritania, became an observer member of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF), an intergovernmental organization aimed at to defend the interests of the main natural gas exporting countries. “Senegal is taking a new step towards responsible exploitation of its natural resources for the benefit of the populations”underlined the Senegalese Ministry of Oil in a press release.
In the south of the continent, in Namibia, a country which has never produced oil or gas, a deposit of 10 billion barrels of oil was recently discovered. This discovery could make the nation one of the 15 largest oil producers by 2035 and the 4th largest in Africa. Enough to arouse the desires of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Among the other hydrocarbon projects developing in Africa, we can also cite Eacop/Tilenga in Uganda and Tanzania, a mega-oil extraction and giant pipeline project carried by TotalEnergies and which is causing controversy. There is also the controversial Mozambique LNG, also run by the French major, stopped in 2021 because of a jihadist attack, but which should restart this year. It must be said that the country, which holds the ninth largest gas reserves in the world, could produce 3/4 of Qatar’s production each year.
Fossils to grow?
While the climate crisis requires us to no longer open new oil and gas fields – the International Energy Agency has clearly stated this since 2021 – the fact that Africa becomes the new Eldorado of fossil fuels is not necessarily good news from this point of view. But it remains difficult to convince countries not to go. For many African leaders, fossil money will indeed allow the continent to develop, to escape poverty, but also to connect the 600 million Africans who still do not have access to electricity, and finally to finance the transition to clean energies, while the resources promised by the North are slow to materialize.
Representing the voice of the African energy sector, the African Energy Chamber (AEC) thus advocates a “pragmatic approach that embraces all forms of energy, including coal, natural gas, renewables and oil”. “We must continue to demand a just energy transition for Africa – we must produce every drop of hydrocarbons in order to transition to clean energy,” declared its president, the emblematic NJ Ayuk, one of the best-known lobbyists in the energy sector in Africa, during Invest in African Energy, which held its second edition in Paris in May. “If natural gas is a good option for rich countries like America, why couldn’t developing countries enjoy the same benefits?” he castigates.
In Senegal, the World Bank estimated in 2022 that the entry into production of hydrocarbon deposits should almost double the growth of the economy. Same outlook for Namibia, where GDP could almost double in ten years. In Mozambique, since the start of production on the FLNG Coral Sul project led by Eni, the country’s GDP has increased by 6% in just one year. It remains to ensure that the incredible benefits of these projects, carried out by Western majors and dedicated to export, benefit the African populations. Which is no small feat.
Governance, a major issue
For Benjamin Augé, associate researcher at Ifri, specialist in energy issues in Africa, interviewed by Novethic, it depends on the country and its governance. “When we look at the different cases, we see that when a country is poorly structured, not industrialized, with weak governance, oil only further destructures the functioning of the State. This is the case of Chad, Equatorial Guinea, Congo and even Nigeria. It is also likely that Mozambique will fall into this trap, where gas will only be used to enrich a ruling class in power since independence in 1975. The counter-example may come from Namibia. The level of civil servants there is good, the civil service functions properly. Oil can be a factor of development and allow the country to invest in public health and education infrastructure. he believes.
The AFD, which has been publishing an overview of the African economy for five years, emphasizes the importance of diversifying its resources. “The most dynamic African economies are not those that depend exclusively on natural resources, particularly oil. On the contrary, it is the most diversified economies that fare best, even in times of crisis. It turns out that they sometimes exploit fossil fuels, but often for a limited part of their gross domestic product, explained Rémy Rioux, president of the AFD before the senatorial commission of inquiry into TotalEnergies. Moreover, the region of Africa which has shown the strongest growth over the past ten years is the Sahel, and this growth is not linked to fossil fuels.”
“Concerning countries that are too dependent on hydrocarbons, they can develop what we call Dutch disease.explains Amaury Mulliez, deputy director of the AFD’s Economic Diagnostics and Public Policies department. The exploitation of these resources will capture the majority of human resources (labor and know-how) and financial capital to the detriment of other sectors. The third effect, with exports, is that the value of the country’s currency increases, making its other exports less competitive.”
Local populations want “sustainable development”
Contacted by Novethic, TotalEnergies, which owns several projects on the continent, for its part highlights the creation of local value. Thus, in Angola, the Kaminho project will involve 10 million hours worked by local companies, mainly for offshore operations and construction on local sites. In Nigeria, on the Ikike project, 95% of hours worked were done locally. And on the Eacop/Tilenga project, there will be more than 1,200 Ugandans and 3,200 Tanzanians at the end of 2023, and 92% of the hours worked since the start of the project correspond to national jobs. “We are far from the 80,000 jobs promised, reacts to Novethic Juliette Renaud of Friends of the Earth France. These are also very precarious jobs (day contracts), low-skilled and risky. Furthermore, these fossil fuel projects destroy local economies based on agriculture or tourism.”
Friends of the Earth, who infiltrated the “Invest in African Energy” summit in May, denounce the expansion of fossil fuels in Africa which only benefits the “imperial powers and African and global elites” all in “exacerbating the climate crisis”. “Mozambique is a clear example of this illusion. Despite the exploitation of coal and gas, only 40% of the population has access to energy. Other effects of these projects have been unhappiness, loss of land, pollution, increased corruption, human rights violations, instability, war/insurgency and the constant shrinking of space of civil society”explain Friends of the Earth Africa.
In Niger, farmers whose land had been contaminated by oil leaks filed a complaint against Shell and won a victory since the major was found guilty of the pollution. In Uganda and Tanzania, communities affected by Tilenga and Eacop are seeking compensation from TotalEnergies for the human rights violations committed there. “People in Africa do not want oil and gas but sustainable development that does not affect their health and their activities. specifies Juliette Renaud. “I have not yet seen any country where oil is used for development,” summarized Maxwell Atuhura, one of the main opponents of the Eacop/Tilenga project, before the Senate commission of inquiry into TotalEnergies.
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