OIL IN ETHIOPIA

Evening Post, Volume CXL, Issue 60, 8 September 1945, Page 7

OIL IN ETHIOPIA

A BLANKET CONCESSION

NEW YORK, September 6. Mr. H. K. Sinclair, president of the Sinclair Oil Corporation, announced! that the Emperor Haile Selassie had given his company an exclusive oil concession covering all Ethiopia. The concession provides that all oil development rights in Ethiopia rest with the Sinclair Corporation for the next five years, after which 50 per cent, of the territory will be released. After a further exploratory five years, another 25 per cent, of the territory will be released. The remainder is under a 50-year lease. The corporation, in return for the right to explore for and ship out petroleum, will pay royalties to the Emperor and, in addition, will build schools, hospitals, clinics, and research foundations and also pay for educating Ethiopians in the United States for the next two years. '■ The Associated Press says that at present it is not announced whether there is any monetary grant outside the royalties and development provisos. It comments that in 1935 Haiie Selassie ceded more than one-half of his empire for oil exploitation by British and American interests in the vain hope that it would prevent the Italian invasion. The deal fell through after causing a world furore. The new concession comes almost on top of the Foreign Ministers' meeting in London, at which the question of Ethiopia may be discussed.