The economic activities of multinational corporations (MNCs) in the extractive industries of developing countries produce a myriad of immediate negative social, economic and environmental impacts on communities hosting their operations. Consequently, stakeholders have increasingly called for (greater) accountability of these corporations for the impacts of their operations on stakeholders and the wider society. The extent to which these MNCs are accountable for their operations' negative environmental impacts in the developing countries is underexplored as prior studies have primarily focused on corporate social responsibility rather than accountability of these corporations. However, accountability apparently means different things to different parties, and especially in a non-Western context. This thesis primarily seeks to explore the concept of accountability in a developing country context and how it is understood and practised within the Nigerian oil industry. More specifically, it seeks to understand the extent to which oil MNCs in Nigeria discharge accountability in the context of gas flaring and oil spills environmental pollution emanating from their operations. The study utilises a mixed methods approach to generate data to provide understanding on stakeholders' conceptions of accountability, the nature of accounts constructed by the MNCs on gas flaring and oil spills environmental incidents, and the plausible corporate sense-making embedded within those accounts. The empirical data produce both general and nuanced conceptions of accountability between the MNCs and stakeholders. An account-giving heuristic highlights four broad and further nuanced accounts the corporations provide on these negative environmental incidents which are largely in conflict with stakeholders' narratives. Moreover, the sense-making analysis of the MNCs' accounts suggests that those accounts apparently serve corporate self-interest rather than the discharge of accountability. However, organisational, institutional, relational, and national contextual factors apparently encourage the un-accountability of the MNCs. Accountability in the Nigerian oil industry will remain elusive without critical institutional and regulatory reforms.

Thesis (MBA)--Stellenbosch University, 2003. / The relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) and competitiveness in South Africa and Nigeria was investigated. Existing data available in literature was used to analyse trends with regards to FDI and competitiveness in South Africa and Nigeria over the last 10 years. According to the UNCTAD report (2002) in 1997, FDI in Africa was concentrated on five countries namely, Angola, Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria and South Africa. Nigeria in the last ten years has consistently outperformed South Africa with regards to the amount of FDI received; yet South Africa outperforms Nigeria on all the competitiveness indices. This has been primarily due to the fact that Nigeria's main source of FDI is the petroleum sector. In Africa 75% of FDI goes into countries endowed with petroleum and mineral resources with very few of these strangling to meet the above list of WAIPA reasons favourable for FDI. The ultimate goal of a nations competitiveness is to increase efficiencies under free and fair market conditions through foreign trade, production and investment. Main results of this study have been the following; • Oil is a major FDI attractor of FDI in Africa, and explains why Nigeria receives more FDI than South Africa. • Although Nigeria does not have a good competitive record relative to South Africa it does however offer competitive fiscal terms to IOC's to explore and exploit the countries abundant petroleum resources. • Oil wealth struggles to filter down to the people of the country, as Nigeria's per capita income remains about fifteen times lower than South Africa's, with its more efficient economy. • This study confirms the fact that many MNC's especially in Africa tend to be driven by resource-seeking opportunities and rather than efficiency seeking opportunities. Unfortunately many of the petroleum exporting countries are unable to use the wealth generated by the petroleum industry to enhance their global competitiveness. The problem is that many countries are not diversified enough and rely extensively on commodities to generate much needed revenue.