For decades, Western nations have positioned themselves as champions of global development, urging African countries to break free from the chains of dependency and chart their own paths to prosperity.
Yet, when African nations like Uganda and Tanzania pursue transformative projects like the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP), they face relentless opposition from the same Western voices that demand self-reliance.
This double standard—thwarting Africa’s oil ambitions while blaming the continent for its economic struggles—is not just hypocritical; it’s a deliberate barrier to African progress.
The EACOP, a 1,443-kilometer pipeline set to transport oil from Uganda’s Lake Albert oilfields to Tanzania’s port of Tanga, is a beacon of hope for two of Africa’s landlocked economies.
With an estimated investment of $5 billion, the project promises to create thousands of jobs—3,800 direct and 20,000 indirect—while boosting foreign direct investment by up to 60% in Uganda and Tanzania.
For Uganda, a nation where over 70% of the population relies on subsistence agriculture, oil revenues could fund schools, hospitals, and infrastructure, lifting millions out of poverty. Tanzania, too, stands to gain from export revenues and energy access, reducing reliance on environmentally harmful wood and charcoal.
Yet, this potential is under siege. Western banks, insurers, and governments, swayed by environmental campaigns, have systematically withdrawn support for EACOP and similar projects.
Over 43 banks, including giants like JPMorgan Chase and BNP Paribas, and 30 insurers have publicly refused to finance EACOP, citing environmental and human rights concerns.
The European Parliament even passed a resolution in 2022 calling for a construction pause, urging a reroute to minimize ecological impact.
Meanwhile, activists in Europe and the U.S., backed by well-funded NGOs, have protested EACOP as a “climate bomb,” ignoring the project’s safeguards, like solar-powered pumping stations and horizontal drilling to protect watercourses.
The environmental argument, while dressed in moral garb, reeks of selective outrage. Western nations built their economies on fossil fuels, with countries like the U.S. and U.K. continuing to expand domestic oil and gas production even amidst the Ukraine crisis.
Africa, which contributes just 4% of global CO2 emissions despite housing 15% of the world’s population, is held to a different standard. EACOP’s projected emissions—379 million tons of CO2 over 25 years—are a fraction of what Western nations emit annually, yet Africa is told to forgo development to save a planet polluted largely by others.
Human rights concerns, another Western rallying cry, also ring hollow. While displacement is a real issue, EACOP has completed 99.6% of compensation agreements for 19,262 affected households and built 177 replacement houses in Uganda alone.
Compare this to the Niger Delta, where Western oil giants like Shell have left communities ravaged for decades with minimal accountability. The West’s sudden concern for African livelihoods seems less about justice and more about control.
This pattern isn’t unique to EACOP. Kenya’s $2 billion Lamu Coal Plant, which could have powered millions of homes, was halted in 2019 after Western pressure.
Nigeria’s oil sector has faced similar financing roadblocks, with Western institutions prioritizing “green” investments over Africa’s immediate energy needs. The result? Africa, with 39% of the world’s renewable energy potential, receives just 2% of global renewable investment, leaving millions in energy poverty.
The West’s narrative is clear: Africa must leapfrog to renewables without the transitional benefits of fossil fuels that industrialized nations enjoyed. Yet, renewables alone cannot meet Africa’s projected 30% energy demand increase by 2040.
Oil and gas, as Uganda’s National Oil Company argues, are critical for export revenues and reducing deforestation from wood-based energy. By strangling projects like EACOP, the West ensures Africa remains tethered to aid and imports, perpetuating the very dependency it decries.
Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni has called this out as “insufferable” and “egocentric.” He’s right. The West’s actions betray a neocolonial mindset, where African nations are denied the agency to exploit their resources as others did.
As Kenyan activist Omar Elmawi aptly put it, EACOP risks becoming “corporate colonialism,” with crude oil exported for Western refineries while Africa bears the environmental and social costs.
If the West truly wants Africa to stand on its own, it must stop sabotaging projects that promise economic transformation. Support EACOP and similar initiatives with financing and technology to ensure they meet global standards, rather than imposing bans that stifle growth.
Africa’s oil is not the enemy; it’s a tool for development in a continent long denied its due. The real injustice is not Uganda or Tanzania pursuing their resources—it’s the West preaching self-reliance while pulling the ladder out from under them.
The writer is a Ugandan journalist with passion for Africa current affairs.
adamkungu7@gmail.com