Petroleum Planning as State Building in Timor-Leste

Abstract

This article examines the aesthetics and contestations surrounding the planning of a farreaching petroleum infrastructure and development scheme on the south coast of Timor-Leste. The scheme, known as the Tasi Mane project, is symptomatic of the central role that oil and gas revenues have come to play in the country's development. The article explores how promises of prosperity mobilise visions of societal improvement that were once associated with independence and examines some of the social and political effects that the anticipation of petroleum wealth and infrastructure engenders. While the availability of revenues from oil and gas generate modernist imaginaries of prosperity, the Tasi Mane project can itself be seen as a technology of state building. This process is, however, fraught with contradictions, since a state's legitimacy and autonomy are dependent on recognition by others.

Oiling the Rigs of State-building: A Political Settlements Analysis of Petroleum Revenue Management in Timor-Leste

“…The treaty on maritime boundaries represents Australia's recognition of its national sovereignty (La' o Hamutuk 2019; see also Strating 2016). Similarly, the Tasi Mane project is a concrete, physical assertion of Timor-Leste's national sovereignty and political authority, challenging outside perceptions of the country's state fragility (Bovensiepen and Nygaard-Christensen 2018). TIMOR GAP maintains that the construction of Tasi Mane will end Timor-Leste's reliance on offshore revenue sharing and taxes and instead bring onshore the economic activities related to the petroleum industry.…”

“…The development of the oil sector has become a "technology of statebuilding" and a "nationalist project" for Timor-Leste (Bovensiepen and Nygaard-Christensen 2018). As such, the oil sector can be considered a crucial arena for political actors and their networks to exert and expand their political influence on the economic development path of Timor-Leste.…”

The Promise of Prosperity: Visions of the Future in Timor-Leste

“…The Tasi Mane project involves resettlement of people who are living in the affected areas, as well as the 'liberation' (as it is called) of vast stretches of land for the construction of the oil and gas infrastructure. Residents living in areas, affected by the construction work are to receive financial compensation for their land (see Crespi and Guillaud 2018). At the time of writing, the identification of land and compensation payments were almost complete in Suai, and land to be 'liberated' was identified in Betano; least progress had been made in Beaço, where the pipeline from Greater Sunrise is to lead to.…”

“…Landowners expressed deep concern about the fact that they would only receive US$3 per square metre of land that they gave up for the Tasi Mane project. Arguments were made that the land prices had gone up to between US$4 and US$15 per square metre, depending on where the land was located, so they would struggle to buy land for the same price (see also Crespi and Guillaud 2018). It is also questionable whether financial compensation is really the best form of compensation for loss of land, because such cash injections can produce conflicts between or among families and do not necessarily provide people with livelihood security in the long term.…”

Just a dream? The struggle for national resource sovereignty and oil infrastructure development along Timor-Leste’s south coast

“…The Tasi Mane project involves resettlement of people who are living in the affected areas, as well as the 'liberation' (as it is called) of vast stretches of land for the construction of the oil and gas infrastructure. Residents living in areas, affected by the construction work are to receive financial compensation for their land (see Bovensiepen and Meitzner Yoder 2018;Crespi and Guillaud 2018). At the time of writing, the identification of land and compensation payments were almost complete in Suai, and land to be 'liberated' was identified in Betano; least progress had been made in Beaço, where the pipeline from Greater Sunrise is to lead to.…”