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Iraq oil ministry control { April 20 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
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Confusion over who controls Iraq's oil ministry
By Charles Clover in Baghdad
Published: April 20 2003 19:50 | Last Updated: April 20 2003 19:50
Ringed by US tanks and guarded by US soldiers with a very exclusive admission list, Iraq's oil ministry on Sunday appeared secluded from the disorder that reigns in the rest of Baghdad.
One question nevertheless provoked a great deal of confusion: who is in charge of the world's second largest petroleum reserves?
The former minister is barred from entering, as are his deputies. A man in a green suit, standing outside the barbed wire, introduced himself as Fellah al-Khawaja and said he represented the Co-ordinating Committee for the Oil Ministry, which few of the employees had heard of.
It draws its authority from a self-declared local government led by Mohamed Mohsen al- Zubaidi, a recently returned exile who says he is now the effective mayor of Baghdad.
According to Faris Nouri, a ministry section chief, the committee has issued a list of who should be allowed into the ministry by US troops guarding the building. On Sunday it was announced that Mr Zubaidi's deputy, former general Jawdat al-Obeidi, would lead Iraq's delegation to the next meeting of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries.
But when asked who was giving the orders at the ministry, most employees pointed to a portly man standing in the lobby, who declined to give his name: "I was a DG (director general) in the old administration, and no one has told me I'm not a DG anymore," he said.
Employees have been reappearing since Thursday at the oil ministry, first to do an inventory of what has been looted and destroyed, and to try and get the generators working again.
The ministry, which largely escaped the wholesale destruction suffered by many other public buildings in Baghdad, is one of the few to be guarded by US soldiers.
The director general said he was confused by the lack of any formal notices, and had a only a vague idea of the committee, backed by the Iraqi National Congress, the formerly exiled opposition group. "I don't honestly know who they are, who chose them, how they are being motivated. I know I am in contact with no one and no one is in contact with me."
However, he lamented the whole US approach to dealing with post-war Iraq. "We have a lot of experience with coups d'etat and this one is the worst," he said. "Any colonel in the Iraqi army will tell you that when he does a coup he goes to the broadcasting station with five announcements.
"The first one is long live this, down with that. The second one is your new government is this and that. The third is the list of the people to go on retirement. The fourth one, every other official is to report back to work tomorrow morning. The fifth is the curfew."
This is usually done within one hour, he added. "Now we are waiting more than a week and still we hear nothing from them."
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