Re Channel 7’s Sunday program 9.10.11 re the oil spill in the Amazon While the plight of villagers as portrayed in your program was heart rending, I could not help but question the notion that the whole of this rests with the oil companies. Someone needs to be held accountable of course, but if we don’t get it right these same circumstances just keep on happening all over this planet. Private investors are critical to the economic development of developing countries. No one else can help more than someone prepared to come in and risk the investment huge sums of money, bring technical skills and project expertise that these countries that are vastly more infamous for their awesome sovereign risk than any form of development or fair dealing. These investors come in with significant assets and negotiate with government. Nothing happens without government approval, and everyone knows that they main thing that keeps the third world the way it is – is corruption. Private investors have no special power. They are often the targets for corrupt officials at all levels, who see them as an opportunity to satisfy their greed for wealth at any cost. Private investors have to navigate their way through the complexities, irrationality and dishonesty of corrupt bureaucracies. Nothing happens without fees, charges, taxes, permits, approvals, introductions and outright bribery to get tangled and corrupt networks on side. Everything costs. So when bad things happen – especially by western standards – and no third world country really recognises in deed the things westerners regard as proper practice – the armies of sanctimonious western do-gooders rush in from the wings to appropriate the lime light. They always condemn the private investor without recognition of the risks and enormous work it has taken to create productivity and employment in these basket case economies. Private investors are held accountable for the multitude of corrupt dealings, dishonesty and thuggery that are everyday occurrences in these countries. But it is not private industry which is responsible for these appalling circumstances. I always thought the reason we have a UN was to stop this kind of totalitarian violence, thuggery, deceit, corruption and outright theft of state treasuries? I thought the UN was supposed to be managing this as this is what leads to war and the kind of mass misery we see on TV every day. To keep sniping at western investors, amounts to a conspiracy to keep these poor miserable people under the yoke of corruption, exploitation and ‘state’ sanctioned violence that has become their fate. While do gooders stake a very clear claim on the moral high ground, it is the western investors who build real economies that will give these people the hope for a better future – not the do gooders. Developing country regimes and ‘governments’ no matter how illegitimate, must be held accountable for the damage they do to people and if the UN won’t do its job, we should dismantle it and take another approach. Given the billions that western taxpayers fork out for the UN – we see this total out of control nonsense happening unrestrained and with monotonous regularity - and the UN just turns a blind eye. It’s unacceptable from every perspective. The problem that sits squarely in the lap of the west is that the very institution we fund to deal with these matters has failed in the most miserable and comprehensive way. We need to stop playing with scapegoats and deal with the root causes. The only thing the UN appears to be good at is to provide opportunities for bureaucrats to indulge in the most cynical sinecures. I am no longer interested in paying their bills! AFH 10.10.11
Posted on: Sun, 17 Nov 2013 03:24:40 +0000