Iraqis will never accept this sellout to the oil corporations

Before embarking on controversial measures such as this law favouring foreign oil firms, the Iraqi parliament and government must prove that they are capable of protecting the country’s sovereignty and the people’s rights and interests. A government that is failing to protect the lives of its citizens must not embark on controversial legislation that ties the hands of future Iraqi leaders, and which threatens to squander the Iraqis’ precious, exhaustible resource in an orgy of waste, corruption and theft.

Iraq’s oil industry is in a parlous state as a result of sanctions, wars and occupation. The government, through the ministry of oil’s inspector general, has issued damning reports of large-scale corruption and theft across the oil sector. Many competent senior technical officials have been sacked or demoted, and the state oil-marketing organisation has had several directors. Ministries and public organisations are increasingly operating as party fiefdoms, and private, sectarian and ethnic perspectives prevail over the national outlook.
This state of affairs has negative results for all except those who are corrupt and unscrupulous, and the voracious foreign oil corporations. The official version of the draft law has not been published, but there is no doubt that it will be designed to hand most of the oil resources to foreign corporations under long-term exploration- and production-sharing agreements.

The oil law is likely to open the door to these corporations at a time when Iraq’s capacity to regulate and control their activities will be highly circumscribed. It would therefore place the responsibility for protecting the country’s vital national interest on the shoulders of a few vulnerable technocrats in an environment where blood and oil flow together in abundance. Common sense, fairness and Iraq’s national interest dictate that this draft law must not be allowed to pass during these abnormal times, and that long-term contracts of 10, 15 or 20 years must not be signed before peace and stability return, and before Iraqis can ensure that their interests are protected.

Guardian