Project Katrina

Over the weekend, news broke that three months after his oil company’s rig set off the largest oil spill in American history, BP CEO Tony Hayward would be stepping down. In his resignation statement, Hayward stressed that, “BP will be a changed company as a result of” its oil spill in the Gulf. Yesterday morning BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg went on CNBC to celebrate Hayward’s performance at BP:

SVANBERG: Tony Hayward has done a great job for the company through his almost thirty years and he has done it very well, greatly as a CEO. He has driven the company’s performance and developed the company in many, many ways. He has also led an unprecedented response in the Gulf of Mexico. But it became obvious to him and to us that in order to rebuild our position, in order to rebuilt our brand and reputation, we needed fresh leadership and that is why we are doing the change.

Not only didn’t Hayward get shit canned, it did a “great job for the company” and will receive a £600,000-a-year ($930,000) pension when he leaves the firm in October. Kind of makes you wonder doesn’t it.

BP CEO Tony Hayward has flown to Abu Dhabi today. Rumors are it is to raise funds and secure new investors from the region as his company’s stocks continue to plummet:

BP’s embattled CEO flew to the wealthy emirate of Abu Dhabi to meet officials amid speculation the oil giant is looking to raise cash to cover clean up costs from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Chief Executive Tony Hayward arrived in the Emirati capital Tuesday and would be staying “a couple of days,” BP spokesman Andrew Gowers said. He would not say whether Hayward planned to sit down with the region’s powerful investment funds, which have provided needed cash to Western multinationals in past times of crisis. “He’s visiting partners as he does from time to time. He’s conducting normal business,” Gowers said.

The Financial Times writes that an “official in the Gulf familiar with BP’s discussions” said “there have been communications between the group and investors in the region since the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, describing them as an ‘immunisation strategy’ as BP looks to its future.” Additionally, the Saudi paper “Al-Eqtisadiah reported Wednesday that a delegation of Saudi investors was headed to London to discuss an acquisition of up to 15 percent of BP.”

Writing in the Toronto Star, David Olive takes apart TonyHayward:

The biggest oil spill in U.S. history quickly found, in the one person of Tony Hayward, its Michael “Brownie” Brown, hapless head of the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency. And its delusional Baghdad Bob, the Saddam spokesman who coalition forces would never take the capital even as American tanks were visible a few thousand yards from where BB stood.

In response to countless media reports that BP has been blocking journalists from covering the oil spill and speaking with clean-up workers, BP CEO Doug Suttles issued a letter last week saying that such reports were “untrue” and reporters can and do have full access:

Recent media reports have suggested that individuals involved in the cleanup operation have been prohibited from speaking to the media, and this is simply untrue. BP fully supports and defends all individuals rights to share their personal thoughts and experiences with journalists if they so choose.

BP has not and will not prevent anyone working in the cleanup operation from sharing his or her own experiences or opinions.

However, this just isn’t true. Not even close. This is reinforced yet again when on Friday, WDSU, the NBC affiliate in New Orleans got to Grand Isle, Louisiana. Private security officials confronted the reporter and said he couldn’t even have access to the public beach. Here is the mind-numbing exchange:

OFFICIAL 1: Every single security guard here has given the instructions to every single news crew that you can be outside of 100 yards of the workers or along the boom.

WALKER: And who’s saying that? Because no one can tell me that, unless you’re the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office, you’re the Coast Guard, or you’re the military, can you tell me where to go on this public beach.

OFFICIAL 1: I can tell you where to go because I’m employed to keep this beach safe. And right now, those are my instructions. I’d like to keep the workers safe as well.

WALKER: I’m going to try to talk to the worker under the tent. Can I do that?

OFFICIAL 1: No, no.

WALKER: He’s on break.

OFFICIAL 1: You are not allowed to interview any workers.

WALKER: The workers can talk to the media, according to the BP CEO two days ago. Still hasn’t trickled down to you all?

OFFICIAL 2: We already heard that one too.

WALKER: What do you mean you’ve “heard that one”? It’s true.

OFFICIAL 1: The e-mail did not explicitly give you permission to do that.

Exactly how much longer is this shit going to keep going on before it stops? I mean when exactly can a private security guard tell anybody, much less a local reporter, that they can’t have access to a public beach.

A few days ago the CEO of BP, Tony Hayward, said in an interview that he wish this was all over cause “I’d like my life back.” Today in an interview with George Stephanopoulos on Good Morning America Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-LA) called for Hayward to be fired for “the way this company’s performed” and expressed his anger for complaining earlier this week that he’d like his life back.

I was watching this week as the CEO of BP was talking about he wants his life back. I’m to the point where I wish the board would call him back, and give us somebody that really wants to make sure that the people of this state, the people of this Gulf Coast region have what they need, when they want, to try and fight this oil spill.

Melancon also said BP should get rid of Hayward because “the buck stops there.”

Yeah a few million people that live around the Gulf of Mexico would like their lives back as well.

Via the New York Time (emphasis added):

The magnitude of the Deepwater Horizon disaster seems to be finally sinking in with investors. BP’s stock plunged more than 8 percent Thursday in American trading in an otherwise strong day for stocks. Since the accident, the American depositary receipts of the company have fallen about 13 percent, closing Thursday at $52.56.

For Tony Hayward, who has led BP for the last three years, the accident threatens to overshadow all of the efforts he has made to burnish the tattered reputation of the company after a refinery explosion in Texas in 2005 and a pipeline leak in Alaska in 2006.

As Mr. Hayward said to fellow executives in his London office recently, “What the hell did we do to deserve this?”

I wonder if Mr. Hayward has never asked himself that question with respect to his annual salary, which Forbes puts at nearly $5 million. But let me help Hayward out. The reason you deserve this is you cut corners to make an extra buck. You lied to the Federal government. And you don’t really care much about safety or the environment. That is how this happened and why you deserve everything you get and then some.