by Michael King
Texas Observer
January 12, 1996

Among the supporting documents recently submitted to the Observer by Freeport-McMoRan, in defense of its multinational interests, was a curious selection of newspaper clippings that Freeport's public relations representatives had given the heading, "Perspective articles on multinational corporations and NGOs." Among Freeport's selection of beleaguered behemoths was yet another multinational with Texas roots, the Royal Dutch/Shell Group, known around the world simply as "Shell." Freeport helpfully provided us with newspaper accounts describing Shell's embarrassments as a consequence of its immensely profitable dealings in Nigeria, where the Sani Abacha military regime had recently executed internationally acclaimed writer, Ken Saro- Wiwa, and eight other activists, on manufactured charges of murder and incitement to murder. Their actual crimes? They were actively opposed to Shell's exploitation of Nigerian resources and to the Abacha regime's direct and brutal support of that exploitation. "See," Freeport seemed to be saying, "these other guys have the same headaches." And well they should.

As it happens, the connections had already occurred to us--Freeport and Shell are separately featured in this issue of the Observer, as a not coincidental consequence of circumstances occurring in two places halfway around the world, where the best interests of the local citizens have been placed in direct opposition to the interests of these multinational corporations and the tyrannical regimes they have embraced as willing partners. The parallels are indeed disturbing.

Peaceful opposition by the citizens has been met with increasing levels of force, until terror, torture and murder are part of the ordinary methods of government. Business goes on, and profits continue to climb.

In each instance, the multinational corporation, in its single-minded determination to buy cheap and sell dear, has ruthlessly exploited the natural resources of the host country--Shell the oil and gas of Nigeria's Ogoniland, Freeport the precious metals of Indonesia's Irian Jaya. In each instance, a military dictatorship which seized power by brute force now uses that force to defend the property interests of the multinational corporation, which proclaims its own innocence and washes its hands of the inevitable consequences of its exploitative relationship to the local people, and its reliance upon its military partners to maintain order and the freedom to operate. In each instance, while mineral wealth is extracted at great environmental cost, a local population is displaced rather than employed, by companies that import most of their labor. And in each instance, peaceful opposition by the citizens has been met with increasing levels of force, until terror, torture and murder are part of the ordinary methods of government. Business goes on, and profits continue to climb. Meanwhile, the officers of the corporation, who live far away and as they choose, shrug at this bloody repression. It's an all too common story, hardly generating notice in U.S. newspapers (it would be more closely covered in the Nigerian and Indonesian press, but those, oddly enough, have mostly been suppressed). But at the moment, these two stories have taken a more complicated turn. In each instance, astute local activists, in collaboration with human rights groups, environmentalists, academics and journalists outside their countries, have managed to "internationalize" their local struggles. And suddenly the home folks-- in Europe, in the U.S., even in Texas--are saying, "Wait a minute--we know what the hell is going on, and we don't like it." Shell is facing boycotts in Europe and America, and Freeport--breathes there any free-thinking Texan who hasn't had his or her fill of Freeport?--is finally being exposed for its dismal record in Indonesia as well as in Austin, and more and more people are beginning to realize that what's good for corporations--or at least for their bosses and stockholders--is not necessarily good for people, the environment, indeed for the country--there or here. It's about time.

One more sardonic parallel. Both of these multinationals, Shell and Freeport, persist in addressing their problems, abroad and at home, not as genuine human and political crises, but as public relations problems, to be managed by the usual public relations methods: a money blitz, press releases, misleading advertisements, and--in Freeport's case at least--by hypocritical and dishonest threats against its critics. Publicly "deploring" the abuses of human and natural rights which have occurred as the direct and indirect consequences of their corporate operations, they will persist in doing nothing to prevent those abuses unless they are forced to do otherwise--by the actions of governments if possible, but more certainly and over the long haul, by the widespread and persistent pressure of a public movement against them, here and internationally.

We must keep the pressure on.

--M.K.