www.chron.com March 9, 2003, 10:38PM By MAE GHALWASH Copyright 2003 Houston Chronicle

Venezuelan community joins protest

Waving Venezuelan flags and posters of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez alongside U.S. enemies Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, members of Houston's Venezuelan community staged a demonstration in the Galleria area Sunday to demand early elections in their native land to oust Chavez.

About 250 marchers banged pots and pans -- a tradition in Venezuelan protests -- and chanted "we want freedom" and "he's leaving, he's leaving," in Spanish. They also waved signs that read "Watch out America, Chavez sponsors international terrorism," with pictures of Chavez next to Iraqi strongman Hussein, Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, Cuban leader Fidel Castro and terrorist bin Laden.

"We elected Chavez in democratic elections, but he's turning the government into a dictatorship. We don't want that. We want democracy in Venezuela; we want respect for civil rights," said Gerardo Urdaneto, a spokesman for the Houston chapter of the Civil Resistance of Venezuelans Abroad, which organized the Houston demonstration.

The demonstration was part of worldwide protests held in some 42 cities around the world, including the United States, Europe, Canada and Latin America, said Norman Carnaham, a publicist for the Houston chapter.

Venezuelans are split over Chavez's rule. His opponents accuse him of destroying the petroleum industry and the economy and of trying to form a Cuba-style leftist state. His supporters credit him for ridding Venezuela of oil giants who filled their pockets with the country's petroleum profits.

In December, oil workers in Venezuela went on strike, crippling the country's economy, to force Chavez from office. The tension spread to Houston, where anti-Chavez activists staged protests demanding a nationwide referendum that would ask Venezuelans whether Chavez should stay in office.

Chavez's opponents were dealt a blow in January when the Venezuelan Supreme Court ruled that the nationwide referendum, which would have come in February, would be indefinitely suspended.

Since then, membership in the organization's Houston chapter soared from 150 to 565, said Mary Grunewaldt, who was dressed Sunday in a T-shirt emblazoned with the Venezuelan flag and who manages the group's membership database. Sunday's march was the group's third since January and eighth since December.

International calendar:

• Iraq/Middle East: Marc Ginsberg, adviser to major news networks on Middle East issues, former U.S. ambassador to Morocco and former presidential adviser on Mediterranean security will discuss post-conflict peace and governance in Iraq and the Middle East. The event starts at 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday at the Junior League Building, 1811 Briar Oaks Lane. Reservations are required. Call the Houston World Affairs Council at 713-522-7811.

• China: Scott Arrington, a partner in the Baker & McKenzie law firm, and Tyrena Holley, commercial officer at the Houston Export Assistance Center, will be among the speakers at the 2003 Exporters Workshop Series, which will focus on exporting to China. Topics will include business opportunities for American companies, legal considerations and whom to call for assistance. The event starts at 8:15 a.m. Thursday at the Greater Houston Partnership, 1200 Smith St., Suite 700. Reservations are required by noon Tuesday. Call the GHP at 713-844-3636.

• Italy: Louis Markos, associate professor of literature at Houston Baptist University, will discuss Dante Alighieri's thoughts on hell, sins and punishments in a talk on Dante's classic Inferno at 6:30 p.m. Thursday at the Houston Italian Cultural and Community Center, 1101 Milford. Reservations are required. Call 281-344-9742.

• Hispanics: Author Oscar Casares will read from and sign his debut collection of short stories on Tex-Mex culture titled Brownsville, which is set in that border Texas town, at 7 p.m. today at Brazos Bookstore, 2421, Bissonnet. For information, call 713-523-0701.

www.nytimes.com March 10, 2003 By PETER T. KILBORN

ANDREWS, Tex., March 8 — As a welcome to a town with the red, white and blue walls of Buddy's drive-in diner, the slapped-up, steel-skinned service shops of long-ago booms and the horizon of grasshopper-like pumping jacks silently sucking up West Texas crude, the banner at the east end of Broadway is no mere salute to civic aspirations.

As long as a tanker truck and newly painted to keep its sentiments fresh, it proclaims: "Andrews Loves God, Country & Supports Free Enterprise."

Andrews, population close to 10,000, lies 42 miles through mesquite-carpeted rangeland from Midland, President Bush's hometown. Patriotism, faith and freedom to make and lose a buck, touchstones of the Bush presidency, form the bedrock of everyday life in the towns of the Permian Basin, still the biggest source of American oil.

Yet in this heart of Bush country, views of war with Iraq run the gamut of national opinion. For every unswerving proponent of war, there is a foe or equivocator. People here want something done about Saddam Hussein, but many cast doubt on their favorite son's diplomacy, urgency and willingness to go it alone. In terms of both their faith and their oil-dependent pocketbooks, they can see as much to lose as to gain from war.

"I feel like we will go to war, and I'll support it," said Jana Peters, 44, office manager at an oil exploration company. "I think that's the only way we can ensure our safety in my country. If Iraq doesn't want to comply with the United Nations, somebody's got to do it."

But Jonnie Miller, 56, a hardy, crew-cut preacher and owner of L & M Backhoe, which specializes in cleaning up spills in the oil fields, worries about war and a loss of lives. "The Scripture says God placed President Bush in office to take care of us," he said, "and my job is to pray for those in power to make godly decisions.

"But who over there," Mr. Miller asked, "wants us doing what we're doing except us and Kuwait? All life is precious to me. I don't want to see one Iraqi killed. I don't want to see Charles Manson killed."

To protesters who see a blood-for-oil impetus to war, people in Andrews say: don't include us. West Texas oil production has been surging, but largely because of commitments in acquiring drilling rights and lining up rigs made one to four years ago, before much talk of war. "It's not like turning on a tap," said Bradley W. Bunn, 37, a proponent of war who this week completed his seventh well in just over a year.

As in much of the Southwest where towns bloomed by cashing in on their gold, silver, copper, potash and uranium, and then atrophied when the commodities ran down or cheaper foreign commodities dislodged them, West Texas towns of Permian Basin have been slowing down since the early 1970's. Some are ghosts.

Texas produced 364 billion barrels of oil last year, 250 billion fewer than in 1992 and 15 percent of the peak production in 1973. In 2000, according to the census, the median family income in Andrews County, population 13,000, was $37,017, down from $43,756 in 1980. The median home value dropped to $42,500 from $59,558.

This city's movie theater has closed. The Hillcrest Motel is shuttered, with a For Sale sign in front. Among the biggest shops left in town are discounters — Alco, Dollar General and Family Dollar.

Lately, however, resurgence is in the air. Oil prices have rebounded from as low as $10 a barrel in the 1980's here, to $20 a year ago to nearly $40 now. By late last month 169 rigs were drilling into the basin, 20 more than in January and 40 more than a year ago, said Morris Burns, executive vice president of the Permian Basin Petroleum Association in Midland. "That's a big increase," he said.

In Andrews, flatbed 18-wheelers lugging drilling and casing pile rumble through town, want ads are looking for welders, electricians, roughnecks and roustabouts. Companies that reactivate long-silenced wells are busy. L & M Backhoe added two more roustabouts to its team of six last week.

Economists attribute much of the rise to faster economic growth and to shrinking supplies of oil because of the oil industry strike in Venezuela and the cold winter. The markets' anticipation of war is contributing, too, they say. A shutdown of Iraqi oil fields or another Arab oil embargo could spur world prices and domestic American production.

But in Andrews, people say the more likely outcome is a short-lived spike in prices, like the one to nearly $40 a barrel as the last war in the Persian Gulf began, followed by the collapse to $20 as it ended. "We're all waiting for the hammer to fall — the next downturn in prices," said Don Ingram, publisher of the twice-weekly Andrews County News. "Everyone assumes it will go down just like before."

At Buddy's, an unabashedly patriotic diner that has held on since 1969 largely on the local appeal of a fat-encrusted deep-fried specialty called steak fingers, a table of oil business retirees while away an hour.

"We've got to get rid of Saddam Hussein," said B. L. Tipton, 77.

But what the oil patch needs most, the men said, is relative price stability like the kind they knew until the mid-1980's. "War is disruptive," said Joseph Golden, 87. "You can't get stabilized."

Anxiety about war has touched Andrews High School. An article in the latest edition of the Round Up, the student newspaper, tells of two senior girls with boyfriends in the armed forces. "I am terrified," it quotes Sara Blodgett saying. "I think they could resolve this without war."

Marcy Hubbard said, "I support a military move against Iraq, because it is better to get rid of him now so that our children and grandchildren won't have to do it." But she added, "If I could say one thing to President Bush and his military advisers, I would tell him to do what they can to protect our military personnel."

On a personal level, President Bush is widely admired in Andrews by many Democrats as much as he is by Republicans. At Buddy's, Elmer Feland, 72 and retired, voted against him and supports a war. "He still needs to be got out of there," he said of Mr. Bush. His wife, Betty, 65 and retired, said: "I agree with that. But he's likable. I like that he believes in God and prayer."

Like him or not, some people here find the president's style in promoting war grating and unstatesmanlike. "I think of Teddy Roosevelt walking softly and carrying a big stick," Mr. Ingram said. "I think that still holds around here."

Edward J. Phillips, 75, a barber, is a Democrat-turned-independent who voted for Mr. Bush. "I think he's a good man, but he needs to slow down on some of his talking" he said. "I wish he wouldn't make so many talks. You can say more in five seconds than you can straighten out in a lifetime."

Between haircuts, Mr. Phillips unfolds a map of the Middle East. Tallying up the population there, he warned of retaliation against the United States. "If all those countries banded together, we would have problems. There's a lot of innocent people who are going to get killed if we go to war."

Mr. Bunn, who contends that the risk of not going to war against Saddam Hussein in Iraq exceeds the risk of trying to remove him from power, said: "I think anybody who listens to the president's speeches would find his language has been even and diplomatic. The idea that he's been too forceful is a bad rap.

"But there's a strain of West Texas straight talk that unfortunately may be misunderstood." Mr. Bunn said. In West Texas, he said, "black is black, white is white and an apple is an apple. We mean what we say."

www.taipeitimes.com NY TIMES NEWS SERVICE Monday, Mar 10, 2003,Page 12

For months, the OPEC has scrambled, with little success, to keep a lid on oil prices. With war threatening as the cartel's ministers meet in Vienna, Austria, this week, prospects for the global economy are so cloudy, analysts say, there is not much left for OPEC to do.

The oil producers are not alone in their plight. Around the world, and especially in the US, the problem of planning for the unknowable is upsetting the decisions of consumers, businesses and investors. That is hampering an economy struggling to better last year's meager growth, weighing on stock prices and subduing consumer spending.

Oil is a significant component of all those calculations. Crude oil prices have hit their highest levels since the Persian Gulf War of 1991, and S&P's estimates that high energy prices have cost the economy US$50 billion in consumer purchasing power, or 0.5 percentage point of growth, just since last fall. The Energy Department predicts that by April, consumers will be paying record-high prices for gasoline in much of the US.

In any effort to assess how prices will move -- and how the economy will react -- the echoes of history are inescapable. Just like in the fall of 1990, the massing of American troops near Iraq and fears that oil supplies from the Persian Gulf will be disrupted have pushed the price of oil well above US$30 a barrel for weeks.

But moste similarities end there, according to industry analysts. While few experts expect a war to lead to shortages of oil, most doubt there will be a replay of the events of the Gulf War.

Most analysts say that key indicators of the oil industry's health -- notably low inventories of oil and petroleum products at American refineries -- suggest that prices will remain steep regardless of military action.

A year-long series of production cuts by OPEC last year gradually reduced global oil supplies as world economies were growing stronger. Then a strike in Venezuela stripped 4 percent of the world's oil supply from the market. So the balance between supply and demand is much tighter than it was on the eve of the Gulf War.

Today, a war in Iraq would remove about 2 million barrels of oil a day from the market, analysts estimate. Some believe that OPEC, which does not disclose its production, has the spare capacity -- concentrated in Saudi Arabia -- to replace that oil. Others say they think the cartel's members are already pumping at full capacity, both in an effort to keep prices from spiraling even higher, at the risk of stifling demand, and to take advantage of the unusually high prices.

Ultimately, the price of oil will likely swing with the progress of a war, analysts say.

allafrica.com Visit The Publisher's Site The East African Standard (Nairobi) OPINION March 10, 2003 Posted to the web March 10, 2003 Otieno Otieno Nairobi

If the predictions of one ancient scholar by the name Malthus were right, the human species would have disappeared from the face of the earth today. Malthus contended that since the human population growth was exponential, it would soon reach a threshold and come down crashing.

But long after he passed on, humanity is not any closer to extinction. Instead, we are watching a population explosion in our time. And many of the latter day scholars have dismissed Malthus as an alarmist-which is not entirely true. Malthus' concern was somehow valid, but he had simply ignored the potential of technology, better healthcare and other factors to reverse the trend for the better.

Nigeria Competition Bill

More recently, some scientists have argued that because crude oil is a non-renewable resource, the world's oil wells would run dry soon. Yet the OPEC members are striking new wells bubbling with the product every other day. The only times there is limited supply are in the events of a pending war in the Gulf or violent demonstrations in Venezuela.

In the same breath, wanton destruction of forests in the past has sent similar panic among Kenyans. It is understandable. The country's forest cover is shrinking so fast, only about 2.5 per cent of our land area is currently under forest-a far cry from the international standard of 10 per cent required of countries. It has thus become rather unfashionable to imagine any development activity taking place in any of our forests. That is why a lot of heat has been generated by the recent revelation that an American investor had bought a section of Karura forest to build a tourist hotel.

Whether or not he acquired it on the strength of a legal notice may not matter much now. But the transaction has not failed to raise some serious issues about environmental conservation in Kenya. Do forests have any other benefits to Kenyans apart from the crucial natural values of attracting rain and acting as water catchment areas? Should we preserve our forests just as part of our national heritage and for their aesthetic value?

At face value, it seems difficult to appreciate that economic benefits can accrue from our forests without undermining conservation efforts. How do we put in check the common economic greed that comes with investments?

The whole world was once locked in a similar dilemma. With high population growth and the zeal to attain economic development, the world's natural resources came under a lot of pressure. It suddenly emerged that the resources were getting depleted at a faster rate than they could recover.

But it was not until 1972 that the problem gained significant international attention. Governments and environmentalists who converged for a conference in Stockholm, Sweden, left with a loose agreement to improve the status of natural resources.

When a similar meeting was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1992, the resolve was much stronger. They even came up with a plan of action, which was compressed in the now popular document with environmentalists, Agenda 21.

One remarkable lesson in the document is the recognition that the environment and economic development are two sides of the same coin. It correctly emphasises the need to strike a balance between ecology and economics using a tool called Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). The environmental expert's version of a cost/benefit analysis, any EIA's twin objectives are to identify and mitigate the dangers posed by the development project on the environment. Where a serious conflict arises, an independent EIA can be relied upon to establish the truth.

Kenya set in earnest to domesticate Agenda 21 in her environmental policy in the National Environmental Action Plan (NEAP) of 1994. The content of NEAP later fed heavily into the authoritative legislation-the Environmental Management and Co-ordination Act, 1999.

Notably, the Act also prescribes an independent EIA for major development activities in the country.

Public opinion may tie the government's hands on such matters.

But in future, the Ministry of Environment, Natural Resources and Environment should find it valuable to subject all development projects to independent EIAs before approving or dismissing them.

One more thing. The government should demand of investors a high degree of corporate responsibility to help conserve the natural resources. But a balance must be struck between ecology and economics-however delicate.

www.planetark.org BRAZIL: March 10, 2003

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil - While Brazil's new left-leaning government is sticking to market-friendly economic policies, one minister with a wild revolutionary past seems less inclined to please investors in her ailing sector - energy.

As prospects strengthened this week for the nationalization of cash-strapped U.S. energy firm AES Corp's (AES.N) Brazilian affiliate Eletropaulo (ELPL4.SA), Mining and Energy Minister Dilma Rousseff has done little to soothe foreign investor nerves.

Analysts say tough remarks by the 55-year old former urban guerrilla suggest stricter government control over the market and pricing policies, which have become vitally important since the government is fighting a surge in inflation.

"So far, the (government's) economic team have been much more orthodox in what they say or do than the energy minister," said Jed Bailey, Latin American director with Cambridge Energy Research Association. "She sounded more radical than others."

Rousseff, a member of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's Workers' Party, is known among leftists who came to power in January for taking part in a daredevil "expropriation" of $2.5 million from a former governor in 1969.

Rousseff fought the 1964-85 military regime, spent three years in jail and was tortured. Later, she got a doctorate in economics from Campinas University and was the finance secretary and twice the energy secretary of southern Rio Grande do Sul state. Rousseff is divorced and has one daughter.

NO DECISIONS YET

So far Rousseff, who inherited a power sector in crisis and mired in uncertainty whether it should be private or state-run, is yet to come up with key decisions on energy and fuel pricing, as well as a model for the electricity sector.

A critic of privatizations, she had denied any plans to nationalize the private part of the power sector.

But the problems at AES, which this week acknowledged a second default on its debt to the government's BNDES National Development Bank in a month, means a nationalization might become the first major event in the sector under her rule.

Rousseff told the Istoe Dinheiro Magazine recently the bank had every right to claim AES assets and did not rule out a provisional federal administration for Eletropaulo.

Analysts said such an act on behalf of a government-run bank would be bad for an already difficult investment climate. The sides have decided to continue talks until next week.

As for the sector's model, Rousseff has promised to come up with a plan by July.

"The government will have to regulate the market, improve the revenues of utilities and guarantee investment. It's a tough task but it has to be done, or we'll have power rationing again in two years," said Osvaldo Telles of BBV Securities. Nine months of rationing ended a year ago.

Her plan may involve a wider use of wind power in Brazil, which Rousseff has advocated in the past using a quotation from Bob Dylan: "The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind."

OIL SECTOR SEEKING GUIDELINES

Rousseff is also responsible for the oil and gas sector, which analysts say needs urgent attention as well.

So far, Rousseff has been focused mainly on fuel pricing, which is key for inflation. Giant state oil firm Petrobras (PETR4.SA) (PBR.N) accounts for nearly all refining in Brazil, but it has not raised prices of gasoline and diesel since December despite a sharp rise in world oil prices.

Petrobras had obtained formal independence in price-setting, seen as key to its profitability, under the previous administration, and analysts attribute the lack of price hikes recently to Rousseff's influence.

Rousseff has said local fuel prices should continue to depend on world oil prices, but the government has to work out a mechanism to protect the population from sharp fluctuations.

"But the energy policy is also much wider than the question of pricing. Natural gas consumption and production, free access to gas pipelines, taxation of providers and producers all have to be tackled," said Jean Paul Prates of Expetro consultancy.

Story by Andrei Khalip