Oil?

This story is scary. It sounds nice at first--an oil discovery off the shores of one of the poorest countries in the world: don't they need the money? But we already know what happens when free money pours into a place like this: the powerful collar the money; and if the country is really unlucky warlords start fighting over the take. Little goes into infrastructure or development, and even in the countries where some does it isn't taken seriously--isn't valued. The important thing is to get money, not to earn it; and if it is easier to siphon from the money stream than produce, who will aspire to build anything? (Cue the joke about Saudis never lifting anything heavier than money)

Sierra Leone already has diamonds and gold, and the free money from that gave them a horror of a civil war. I'm not sure how far Sierra Leone exists as a state even now, years after the war. Can they find the upright men they need?