Black Gold - Black Scorpion

The BIAFRAN WAR (1967-1970) remembered over half a century later

STERN Magazine - The Black Scorpion: "we will aim at everything - even if it is not moving"

TV Presenter Juliette Foster: "an intense, emotional memoir. Black Gold Black Scorpion couldn't be timelier. George S Boughton was an oil engineer in Nigeria during the Biafran war and what emerges from this memoir is a withering indictment of governing elites and the destructive consequences of their out-of-control behaviour. Around a million people starved to death or were killed in the fighting; yet the news vacuum meant that Boughton and other expat workers were often in the dark about the true extent of what was going on. Black Gold Black Scorpion is a fascinating, first-hand account of how a nation at war with itself became a magnet for cold war politics as it sank into moral darkness".

Recounted are the lives of a young oil engineer, his wife and new-born child, during the Biafran War, when they inadvertently lived through one of the worst episodes of African history. Working in an industry that has gone on to pollute massively with oil, theirs is a different story of Africa, oil and aid. The author describes the political elites and those, like Ojukwu and Adekunle, who fought them - having himself been captured and detained, one to one, by the mythically ruthless Black Scorpion; this, the strangest of events, enabling him to observe at close range the disintegration of a powerful personality.

More especially, the author's and his family's interaction with the people of the area, the people of Igboland, serves to underline how most of Africa continues to be let down by the pillars of the modern world - political elites, capitalists, the media and warring world powers.

Author: George S. Boughton
Publisher: GB Publishing Org
Published: 08/31/2015
Pages: 146
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.38lbs
Size: 8.00h x 5.25w x 0.34d
ISBN: 9780993275609

About the Author
Boughton, George S.: - "Born to English parents in Eritrea, George S Boughton, Chartered Engineer, BSc.MechE(Hons), MIMechE (UK), has had an internation education: Les Petit Oiseau (Rome), Roaring Brook Elementary School (New York), Wellington School (Somerset UK), and Northampton College of Advanced Technology (City University, London). Boughton went on to lead an expatriate life, firstly in oilfield engineering with Shell in Nigeria and the UK and then with Creole Production Services International in Kuwait. He was a partner of Form Arabia Furnishing in Kuwait, a consultant in change management with the Nichols Group in Hong Kong and then in information management services with Azeus Systems in Hong Kong and South Africa. Now based in the UK, this international lifestyle coupled with his deep knowledge of oil exploration and production as well as dire experiences working in conflict zones through the Biafran War have served him well in writing Black Gold - Black Scorpion."

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