Nigeria And Angol African Countries Plagued By The Resource Curse

Situated along the coast of the Gulf of Guinea is a region about the size of South Carolina that offers a land full of sweet, light crude oil, known as the Niger Delta (Delta). The Delta sits within the country of Nigeria in West Africa and is in a constant state of crisis, underpinned by a multitude of key issues. Those issues include severe poverty, soil and water contamination, high infant mortality rates, low life expectancy, depletion of natural resources, corruption, and armed militia groups. These issues have one thing in common: oil.

Niger Delta region, placing the Nigerian oil output down to a third of its capacity” (Klare 3).

A major challenge and cause of serious medical issues in Sub-Saharan Africa is the lack of access to a clean water supply. There are 345 million people that lack access to water in Africa. Unfortunately, when water is available it is high in contamination. When wells are built and water sanitation facilities are developed, they cannot be maintained properly to due to limited financial resources. Water quality testing is not performed as often as necessary and the people are unaware that the water may not be safe to drink. Oftentimes, when a source of water has been provided, the quantity of water is often given more attention over the quality of. Lack of clean drinking is the leading cause of diarrheal diseases in Sub-Saharan Africa and causes 7.7% of deaths in Africa. Diarrhea is caused by numerous bacterial, viral and parasitic organisms most of which can be spread by contaminated water. The importance of diarrheal diseases has mostly been overlooked. Through UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO) there have been some accomplishments during the

The Republic of Niger, a poor, landlocked country, located in the heart of Sub-Saharan West Africa. Niger has seen its fair share of change throughout the decades; moving away from the control of the French Parliament in 1960, Niger formally declared its independence. Despite this bold act of independence, Niger would not see its first steps towards democracy until the early 1990’s, when they held their first open election as a free state. However, even with the empowerment of the people in a democratic government, Niger has seen itself nearly torn apart as a result constant coups, that have occurred as recently as 2010. Such instability has led to incredulous amounts of corruption and poverty, within the Niger government. This lack of stability and constant turnover in government, has been a driving factor behind the lack of resources available for education in Niger.

1. Agriculture as a key industry in sub-Saharan Africa and Australia is under threat from severe drought, and drought triggers a series of chain-reactions.

Nigeria has not flourished the ability to manufacture direct products in its own country. Instead, imports, 85% of its national demands and is a customer to many developed countries who gain greater profit from Nigeria's inability. Western countries like France forged deep ties with governments rich in major oil, gas and mining companies, strategically allowing themselves to secure exploration and production rights in exchange for royalty payment (Frank Vogl, 2012). These strategies have always resulted in a greater profit for

Dominated by agriculture grown for export markets since colonial times, the economy of this West African nation is beginning to diversify (Michael Radu). According to statistics provided by the International Monetary Fund, in 2006 revenues from oil and refined products surpassed earnings from the nation’s biggest cash crop, cocoa (African Studies Center). The government in 2011, predicted that the nation’s biggest source of wealth would be petroleum resources. Currently more than 30 international mining companies are mining and exploring reserves of gold. Political stability will determine is multinational energy and mining companies can assist with bringing gold, natural gas, diamonds, nickel, oil, and other natural resources. Foreign investments have slowed down due to political instability, which contributed to the country’s initial financial success. Economic growth has come to a standstill. Although the GDP growth rate improved from about 2% in 2008 to 4% in 2009–2011, per capita income has continuously dropped since 1999, with a slight improvement in 2009–2010 (Central Intelligence

For example, Shell Oil, an MNC (Multi National Corporation), extracted 50% of Nigeria’s yearly crude output, and 14% of its own output from the Niger delta region (The Changing Nature of Third World Exploitation, 1995). Though a large number of the local populace was recruited by Shell to serve as the basic labor force, there has been no change in the deplorable conditions the locals were living in. Over a period of 15 years, due to massive and widespread oil spills, heavy land degradation of the alluvial soil has taken place. The locals, who come from an agriculture based society, have in effect, been deprived of their ancestral way of life, their heritage, all due to the greed driven actions of the partly

In recent times, a lot of countries in Africa practice a federal system of government where a mandated person is elected and in power for four years, but will not leave power because of corruption and oppression, making it difficult to create a room for a change. Most presidents will remain in power for decade’s threatening its people, oppressing and creating division amongst its citizens, thus democracy is abused. Most times, the president of 80% of countries in Africa, divert funds for its state and country into their own personal accounts, leaving people to die of

Imagine if you, living in the United States, lacked basic healthcare, and a basic education. Though this may sound absurd to many, it is a reality for most of Angolan citizens. Angola is an African nation located on the South-west coast of Africa. Angola is North of Namibia, West of Zambia, and South of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Angola’s government type is a unitary state. In a unitary government, the power is held by one central authority, but in a federal government, such as: the United States, Canada and Australia, the power is divided between national (federal) and local (state) governments. The president of Angola, Jose Dos Santos, has not focused on the healthcare or education of his country’s citizens throughout his 36 years in power. Dos Santos has lead Angola through a brutal civil war that ended in 2002. It does not take much work to make sure that money is going to where it is truly needed. Many say “It doesn’t take new discoveries to cure easily preventable illnesses such as malaria and malnutrition.”

African countries have been going through one of the worst recessions in our day in age. Some of the things that Africa lacks as a continent are food supply, water supply, shelter, a stable government to control these key aspects in each country, and many more to come in the future because of the daily issues Africa is facing because of corruption in their individual government as countries. Recent studies show that, over 70% of major corruption cases in Sub-Saharan Africa involve phantom firms, which is financial entities that are currently almost impossible to trace or track without improvements in regulatory oversight, resulting in a tax loss of about $52 billion.

Nigeria, with a population of 190,584,690 people is the most populous country in West Africa. Marked with huge reserves of oil and natural gas, oil exploration in Nigeria first began in the year 1908, with long breaks during the first and Second World War. After the further discovery of commercial oil fields in Oloibiri in 1956, crude oil has since being produced in large quantities. Today, the country produces a maximum capacity of 2.5 million barrels of crude oil per day, and is the world’s sixth largest producer of crude oil. Crude oil export, accounts for 90% of Nigeria’s earnings. Oil exploration occurs onshore, on land and swamps, while off-shore operations occur mainly in water depths reaching 2500m. Currently, crude oil is

Nigeria is an Agricultural and oil rich nation but characterised by Political instability, corruption, poor

The resource-rich countries are more likely to be authoritarian than democracies (Mikesell, 1997). Other scholars present evidence that democratic government, especially parliamentary democratic, help to avoid resource curse (Damania and Bulte 2003). Unfortunately, the Republic of Angola is ruled by a dominant president and the ruling party; the opposition is marginalized, and elections are “held basically to render legitimacy to the incumbent regime” (Amundsen, 2011). Contrary to popular belief that the dictators are removed by the masses, Svolik presents quantitative data that shows two-third of the dictators were overthrown by the ruling coalition (Svolik, ). Therefore, it is in the dictator 's best interest to buy off important inner circle elites known as the ruling coalition to make sure that he continues to stay in power. Svolik 's findings explain why authoritarian government fuels corruption and has no accountability to the masses and no transparency of the funds. Thus, corruption in Angola is extreme;

Most children in the Niger delta have little or no education, due to lack of funds from their parents who have lost their lands and have no jobs because of limited opportunities. The Niger delta government and the oil companies have refused to look into the situation; instead they favor their close relations neglecting the masses. Corruption in the Niger delta has led some youths in taking drastic measure in order to put food on their table. For example, Ikechukwu Efe an indigene of the Niger delta said that some of his friends created their own “oil refinery”, which is made up of crude oil in metal barrels with controlled heat from fire woods. This is a dangerous process in refining crude oil but the degree of poverty in the state left his friends with no choice. If only the government of the Niger delta have created jobs with the wealth of the state Ikechukwu’s friend would not have to put their lives in danger. Until corruption is put to an abrupt the people of the Niger delta will continue to live in poverty.