Oil Firms' Rich Concessions to Tainted African Ruler Probed

[Rose Siding]

snip>
Mobil Oil Corp. offered the West African leader a stake in an oil trading business for $2,300, according to documents the company filed with a Senate subcommittee that were released last month
Now, the company says, that stake is valued at about $645,000.
...
Business ties between Obiang and seven U.S. oil companies, including real estate leases and investment in energy production facilities, are the subject of a probe by the Securities and Exchange Commission, according to the companies and lawyers familiar with the investigation. Attorneys familiar with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act say the investigation involves the broadest examination of the oil industry's overseas practices since the law was passed in 1977.

Exploration by U.S. companies in Equatorial Guinea, previously an obscure cocoa producer, began to pay off in the late 1990s as the U.S. sought new sources outside the turbulent Middle East to meet its rapidly growing demand for foreign oil. The effort intensified after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and again after the invasion of Iraq last year.

The hunt for energy has pushed Washington and the oil industry into relations with regimes in the former Soviet Union and West Africa whose records on human rights and corruption are similar to those of traditional U.S. suppliers in the Middle East.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-guinea18dec18,0,3346113.story?coll=la-home-headlines

What country was it where Jeb! went with a suitcase full of cash that he said he didn't know was on the plane?

[rodeodance]

1. umm.. I do not know the Jeb and suitcase full of money story--

[Rose Siding]

2. Here's the story...

Now that I re-read it, the details are all wrong- Nigeria, water pumps, not oil...(but fun; this article reminds that Feeney- just implicated in vote fraud- was Jeb's running mate)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miami/4221945.htm

It was 1991, dad was in the White House, and Jeb Bush was hopscotching through Nigeria in a corporate jet, on his way to meet government officials he hoped would buy $74 million worth of water pumps from his South Florida business partner.

On the jet with Bush was a Nigerian associate in the deal, Al-Haji Mohammed Indimi, who carried several heavy Hartmann suitcases. At least one of the bags, the airplane's pilot says, was packed with cash to bribe the Nigerian officials.

Did Jeb Bush know about the cash in the suitcase? Did he understand what the money was for?

Bush declined to be interviewed for this story. His campaign emphatically denied that he knew anything about suitcases full of bribe money.
...
Several times, Bush business associates have landed in prison or in deep legal trouble. Twice in the 1980s, while his father was vice president, the young Jeb Bush intervened in Washington on behalf of people who turned out to be hucksters -- assistance that, however unwittingly on Bush's part, helped advance schemes to defraud the U.S. government of millions of dollars.

Tom Feeney, Bush's running mate in the 1994 governor's race, put the issue succinctly in a letter to GOP officials at the time: ``The only documented allegations come down to the fact that he did business with people that turned out later to be deadbeats and crooks.''

[acmavm]

3. I could be wrong (I frequently am) but I think that one of the biggest

mistakes democrats are committing right now is not bringing into the forefront a lot of Jebbie's illegal and corrupt deals. We need to get to this rat before he starts campaigning for pResident.

And please, don't tell me that he's said he's not going to run. Since when has any member of that family told the truth? If they say they're not going to do something, then its a pretty safe bet that that is EXACTLY what they're going to do.

[Rose Siding]

5. You could be right

That he won last time was very disheartening. A couple of papers down there were surprisingly aggressive in their coverage of his business dealings. I remember a Bacardi scandal and several damaging remarks overheard by reporters. Nothing stuck and so when the issues are brought up again, we'll hear "o that's been vetted!" like we hear about W all the time.

The bushies are drawing lines in DC right now. The Kerik thing can be aimed at Rudy, Frist defending rummy leads to a stand-off with Hagel and McCain.

Farther down the line, Jeb's son is gonna be trouble. The repressed repubs love a pretty face.

[seemslikeadream]

4. Riggs and Equatorial Guinea

This maybe of interest

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=125&topic_id=9558&mesg_id=11993&page=

Threads on Equatorial Guinea
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=125&topic_id=9558&mesg_id=18254&page=

Threads on Equatorial Guinea part 2
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=125&topic_id=9558&mesg_id=25607&page=