Mexico Says Oil Monopoly Struggling

[Omaha Steve]

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20070318/D8NUQT080.html

Mexico Says Oil Monopoly Struggling
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Mar 18, 5:25 PM (ET)

By MARK STEVENSON

MEXICO CITY (AP) - Mexico's state oil monopoly is in "critical" condition and needs to boost exploration and seek outside expertise to replenish oil reserves that are currently set to last less than a decade, energy officials said Sunday.

President Felipe Calderon, however, said during a ceremony marking the 69th anniversary of the nation's oil nationalization that there are no plans to privatize the industry and that Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, "will always continue to belong to all Mexicans."

Pemex's proven reserves have fallen to the equivalent of 9.3 years of production from 9.7 years in 2005, and daily output declined last year by 2.3 percent to about 3.2 million barrels, officials said at the ceremony in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz.


In this undated file photo provided by Mexico's national oil company, Pemex, on June 13, 2006, an offshore oil installation is seen in the gulf of Mexico near the coast of Campeche, Mexico. As debts mount for Pemex, which commemorates its 69th anniversary Sunday, the company faces bigger challenges. Pemex's main shallow-water Cantarell oil field off the Gulf coast is slowly running out of oil, while the company struggles with leaky pipelines that have led to spills and explosions. (AP Photo/Pemex)

"The situation of Petroleos Mexicanos is critical and merits immediate attention," Pemex Chief Executive Jesus Reyes Heroles said.

FULL story at link.

[Xipe Totec]

1. That's why the natives call oil

The devil's excrement.

whatever it touches, is ruined.

[ret5hd]

2. Oil never runs out...Peak Oil naysayers say so.

[gravity]

3. How can an oil monopoly be struggling?

[Igel]

5. Not hard, really.

Money needed for infrastructure and exploration is pulled out for the 'share holders', to make the Board look good and for short-term gain.

Because of pride and dignity, outside help isn't sought: Do it alone or be called a traitor.

Employees are paid above average wages, can't be fired, and there are too many of them.

Employees are hired based on relationships, not based on merit.

There's no competition. If you can explain to your Board why the organization does crappy work, well, who's to say otherwise. It's not like you lose market share or opportunity: If you don't have them, nobody does.

There's lax law enforcement: When your Board writes the laws, enforces the laws, and benefits from what you do, the Board is unlikely to enforce anything that reduces the (short-term) benefit it receives. The damage--environmental damage, corruption, etc.--must exceed the short-term benefits (money, employment) before anything's done. Think USSR, China ....

[GliderGuider]

4. For a peek (peak?) at what's just around the corner

Things are going to get really bad, really fast as the output of Mexico's giant oil field, Cantarell, collapses.

Mexico: Peak Oil in Action

[Javaman]

7. I'm just waiting here in Austin for the Mexican refugees when the

civil war breaks out down there.

Or here, because we do get a chunk of our oil from Mexico after all...

[Peace Patriot]

6. When a rightwing corporatist says, "there are no plans to privatize ___," look out!

They speak in opposites, as we know. (Whatever they say, figure the opposite is true, and you won't ever be far wrong.)

Why do you think the corporate rulers stole the Mexican presidential election last year? Why did Bush visit Mexico last week? Why does the Bush Junta revile Hugo Chavez--a democratically elected president in a very democratic country--and why did Bush's giant gangster bosses send Bush to South America, to try to split Brazil and Uruguay off from the Andean democracies (Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela), where all the oil is? What is Iraq all about--and what is any of this all about--but the privatization and theft of the last oil reserves on earth from the people who should benefit for them, to the profit of the super-rich, who have no right to it, and are rich enough already?

Bush failed, by the way, in South America--failed rather spectacularly. And because of the success of the Bolivarian revolution in Venezuela, and its impact on the continent, even Felipe Calderon felt compelled to lecture Bush, to his face, on the sovereignty of Latin American countries, mentioning Venezuela in particular. But Calderon is an opportunistic and a snake-in-the-grass (and was responsible for the violent smash-down of the huge, peaceful, democracy movement in Oaxaca, where teachers, community elders, union leaders and other innocent people have been raped, kidnapped, tortured and murdererd by rightwing paramilitaries under the control of the fascist governor). So his words can be taken with a grain of salt (although it's remarkable that he felt obliged to say them). Bush desperately needed a Latin prize to present to his corporate masters, and it's a good bet that Mexican oil was it. Oil is the driving force of the Bush Junta. Greed for oil. Mass murder to control the earth's last oil. Torture. Lawlessness. Lies. Deceit. War. Ripping up our Constitution. Stolen elections. It's all about oil. And you can be sure Mexico's oil was Topic No. 1 between Calderon and Bush.