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| Africa: Southern |
| Zimbabwe’s fuel crisis deepens as Libya deal falters |
| 2003-07-20 |
| Zimbabwe’s petrol crisis is set to worsen after President Robert Mugabe’s attempt to resume fuel supplies from Libya stalled. He was unable to reach an agreement over the value of oil assets mortgaged to Libya’s leader, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. Bob couldn’t close a deal with Gaddafi? Heavens! Mr Mugabe agreed to mortgage Zimbabwean oil assets to Libya in exchange for oil when he met Colonel Gaddafi in Tripoli earlier this month. These included a major oil pipeline, which runs from Beira port in Mozambique to Zimbabwe’s eastern city of Mutare, as well as oil storage facilities in Harare, under an asset arrangement deal aimed at settling Zimbabwe’s debt to Libya and securing fresh fuel supplies. Senior oil industry sources in Zimbabwe said Libya had not taken over the assets because Gaddafi wanted "to pay peanuts for them". They said the state-run National Oil Company of Zimbabwe (Noczim) had done an independent valuation of the assets in conjunction with an Italian company, Roux Italia, and valued them at about $150m (£95m). Libya’s oil company, Tamoil, valued them at only $38m. This seems awfully capitalist for a bunch of socialists. A Zimbabwean oil official said: "This is totally unacceptable." Officials said it was unclear how the disagreements would be resolved. They said they had left everything in President Mugabe’s hands. They said a powerful lobby in the Zimbabwean oil sector had also emerged which was strongly against the decision to mortgage the oil assets to Libya, even if an appropriate value was agreed. Cuts into their vigorish. Another official said: "These are critical national assets which must be under the control of Zimbabweans. Giving them to anyone is like putting control of your No one does other than Bob, and he needs that for the upcoming shopping spree in Gay Paree. Tamoil halted fuel supplies to Zimbabwe after Noczim accumulated a $67m debt. The debt remains unpaid and Zimbabwe has failed to supply agricultural commodities it had promised to Libya to offset the debt. Colonel Gaddafi is said to want Zimbabwe’s oil facilities as part of his plans to supply fuel to other southern and central African countries such as Zambia, Malawi, Botswana, Swaziland and Mozambique. The pipeline from Beira has been his prime target. Awfully mercantilist for a socialist. The latest problems with Libya have forced Noczim to abdicate its responsibility to import fuel for the whole country, leaving it to private importers. But the private importers sell the oil on the black market at The day the apparatchiks can’t get around by car is the day Bob leaves. |
| Posted by:Steve White |