Back in 2000 construction began on a $3.7 billion pipeline running from oil fields in southern Chad to the Atlantic coast of Cameroon. An international consortium led by ExxonMobil and ChevronTexaco, promised the project would be a model for Third World energy projects, and would alleviate poverty in Chad and promote political reform and stability... The project was completed a few years ago and there appears to have been little or no poverty reduction in Chad since the oil began flowing... I don’t know much about the rebels and they surely aren’t angels... But Deby’s corruption and the failure of the pipeline project to reduce poverty have probably helped them try to build support.