This is how Total exploits rivalry and nepotism in Africa

18 November 20212 years ago babelfish

To implement its penetration into Africa, Total counted on the support of the late Tanzanian president John Magufuli. The point of Giuseppe Gagliano

TotalEnergies made no secret of finding it difficult to conclude the Tilenga oil project in Uganda.

The national director of the TotalEnergies operator, Philippe Groueix, remains concerned both for political reasons and for reasons related to the bargaining to be stipulated with the workers. In fact, Tanzania has easily overcome the impasse linked to regulatory issues, and therefore the country will have the possibility of accessing oil resources thanks to the 1,600-kilometer pipeline that will carry crude oil from Uganda Lake Albert to the Tanzanian port of Tanga within 2025.

TotalEnergies, in fact, to implement its penetration strategy in Africa counted on the very significant support of Tanzanian President John Magufuli – who died in April 2021 – to exert pressure on his Ugandan counterpart Yoweri Museveni. In the past Magufuli had carried out purges and replacements, such as that of the head of the Uganda Revenue Agency Doris Akol accused of an initial failure to sell the shares of Tullow Oil to TotalEnergies by appointing his nephew John Musinguzi, a consultant for telecommunications.

But the Ministry of Energy was also purged. Just think of the permanent secretary Robert Kasande, replaced by Pauline Irene Batebe or the Minister of Energy Mary Goretti Kitutu replaced by Ruth Nankabirwa.

This example illustrates in an excellent way how any multinational oil company – or not – that wants to penetrate the African market must implement strategies that are not exactly orthodox from a political point of view and must take into account both the deep and atavistic internal rivalries, but also the role of nepotism. in the African political entourage.

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/energia/total-africa-john-magufuli/ on Thu, 18 Nov 2021 07:40:48 +0000.