The per capita wealth yet exceeds just 500 dollars

After three weeks of detention in prisons of Brazzaville, Christian Mounzéo and Brice Mackosso have developed, the end of April, provisional release. These two Congolese were accused of embezzling funds from an association. "Their only crime was to be advocates of transparency in the use of oil revenues in their country," corrects Michel Roy, Director of international advocacy to help Catholic and coordinator of the French platform of "publish what you pay".

Brice Mackosso and Christian Mounzéo were relays, in the Congo, this campaign, supported by 300 international civilian organizations. Its goal is to bring the oil and mining industries to publish all income paid to the States in which they operate. And thus break the culture of secrecy that still permeates widely relations between majors and political powers.

Opacity and underdevelopment

Corruption, embezzlement, waste: Africa does not have the monopoly of the opacity in the oil sector. But the consequences of this lack of transparency are particularly devastating. In addition to black gold fueled many conflicts on the continent, "corruption is one of any major factors of underdevelopment in African oil countries", provides Marie-Claire Aoun, researcher at the center of geopolitics of energy and materials first from the University Paris-Dauphine.

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Nigeria, leading producer of black gold on the continent, would, according to estimates, accruing some 100 billion dollars of oil revenues between 2000 and 2004. The per capita wealth yet exceeds just 500 dollars. Congo fourth producer of black gold in sub-Saharan Africa, holds the sad record of having a "debt among the highest per capita in Africa", said Michel Roy. No African producer countries oil represents up to 90 of exports to Angola, Nigeria and Guinea Equatorial was able to transform its oil revenues in social and economic development sustainable.

While crude oil prices are soaring, non-governmental organizations are not the only claim that oil countries recovering from the order in financial circuits of black gold. International donors started, especially when they were asked to dip into the Pocket and undermine the abyssal debts of many African countries. Accession to the Initiative of transparency in the extractives (EITI), launched by British Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2002, has become an implied, at least, of creditors to make these deletions of debt.

It is not a coincidence so well with good wishes suddenly turned, in the South of the Sahara, to open the books of the oil, while the EITI is not formally required. Nigeria, Congo Brazzaville, Gabon, Cameroon, Chad announced readiness to play the game.

"Indigestible information."

The Congo put online hundreds of scanned pages, chronicling in detail its various contracts with oil companies. "An indigestible information to possible, with indecipherable data, even for the finest specialists", summarized Michel Roy. And several cases of justice have shown that the Congo, through different financial arrangements, conceals a portion of the revenues made by the national society of the oils of the Congo to keep out of reach "vulture funds", investment funds who purchased with haircut, the Congolese debt pledged on black gold sales.

Brazzaville has yet won his bet. In March, the international monetary fund and the World Bank were granted, if he continues to play the "good students", entitled to the benefit of a remission of debt.