Santa Monica, Calif. – Roberto Cobaria sees blood beneath the cloud forests of northeastern Colombia. Occidental Petroleum (OXY – news) sees the oil it needs to win higher profits for disgruntled shareholders.
That clash of world views came to a head at Occidental’s annual meeting on Friday.
Cobaria, a leader of Colombia’s U’wa tribe, attended Occidental’s annual meeting for a second straight year, hoping to halt company plans to pump oil on land claimed by his people.
At stake are oil-rich lands that could boost profits for both Los Angeles-based Occidental and the Colombian government, which has seen production in other fields decline.
But the U’wa, a 5,000-strong semi-nomadic tribe, have threatened to commit mass suicide by jumping off a cliff if Occidentals brings in drills.
“Our land is part of Mother Earth. It’s not for sale,” Cobaria told a gathering of supporters before the meeting. He then entered the heavily guarded meeting and brought his case to the shareholders.
Cobaria called oil the blood of Mother Earth. He sang a song dedicated to her to a room full of about 400 shareholders and row of still-faced executives staring down from a stage.
Occidental executives told shareholders at the meeting they have helped the U’wa tribe and respected the land, even though they say it belongs to the Colombia government.
“We have been neighbors and friends, good friends for quite some time,” Rodolfo Segovia, a former Colombian senator and Occidental director since 1994, told Cobaria.
The company in the past has indicated it is willing to give indigenous Colombians like the U’wa better royalties to gain access.
But since acquiring leases for the land in 1992, the dispute with the U’was has forced it to avoid drilling despite a target of doubling earnings from its oil business in the next several years.
“Occidental has stayed away from further development … until these issues are resolved,” Segovia told shareholders.
The U’wa and Occidental seem worlds apart according to Cobaria’s advisers.
Andrew Beath, who works for the environmental group Earth Ways in Malibu, Calif., said he sat in on a meeting between Cobaria and Oxy executives last year.
“All they did is say thank you for coming and we can’t comment,” Beath said.
