Africa's Oil Spills

The U.S. media and political machine has turned its full force on BP and U.S. President Barack
Obama has set up a commission into the leak which is sending an estimated 5,000 barrels per day
(bpd) into Gulf of Mexico waters.

In contrast, the international media has largely ignored the latest incidents of pipeline damage in
Nigeria, where the public can only guess how much oil might have been leaked.

The most recent damage in Nigeria, which has not been attributed to militant attacks that have
preyed on Nigerian oil infrastructure for years, forced U.S. operator ExxonMobil to relieve itself
of contractual obligations by declaring force majeure on its exports of Nigerian benchmark
crude.

The light sweet crude is particularly well-suited for refining into gasoline and is regularly
supplied to the United States, the world's biggest oil burner.

Exxon declined the opportunity to give details of the damage, clean-up or repair work.

An industry source, who declined to be named, said 100,000 bpd of oil had leaked for a week
from a pipeline that has since been mended.

"If this (the BP spill) were in the Niger Delta, no one would be batting an eyelid," said Holly
Pattenden, African oil analyst at consultants Business Monitor International. "They have these
kind of oil spills in Nigeria all the time."

SHARE PRICE IMPACT

BP's share price has fallen around 18 percent since news of the fire at the drilling station on April
20, while Exxon shares were largely unchanged after the force majeure announcement.

The largest operator in Nigeria, Royal Dutch Shell has clashed with the Nigerian government for
decades following numerous spills in Africa's largest energy producer.

Shell said in a statement on its website that its Nigerian joint venture cleans up oil spills as
quickly as possible, no matter what their cause, but is sometimes delayed by security concerns or
because some communities deny access.

The Anglo-Dutch major said the volume of oil spills in Nigeria for its joint venture was almost
14,000 tonnes last year, the equivalent of around 280 bpd, mainly because of militant attacks on
facilities.

"It (the U.S.) is without doubt the worse place for BP to lose their political capital," said James
Marriott, oil and gas analyst at environmental organization Platform.
"If the U.S. administration gets aggressive against BP, then it's a problem for them offshore,
onshore in terms of shale gas, for conventional gas, refining, some cross-border projects with
Canada and further afield."

In the United States, BP's massive spill and the risk of an environmental catastrophe could have
implications throughout the industry as it has reopened the debate about deepwater drilling.

Analysts say, however, the world is hugely dependent on deepwater drilling to secure oil
supplies.

The ExxonMobil force majeure relates to shallow offshore oil, but much of West Africa's crude
production, like that in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, is deepwater.