Who gains from Africa's new oil finds?

It is called the "resource curse". Africa may be blessed with enormous natural reserves of oil, but so far most Africans haven't felt the benefit.

In Nigeria, what has been seen as a failure to spread oil wealth to the country's poorest people has led to violent unrest.

Now, there's been a rash of new discoveries Britain's Tullow Oil has found oil in Uganda, and a consortium of Western firms including Tullow has made a major discovery off the coast of Sierra Leone. Oil is also expected to start flowing from Ghana next year.

World Business News's Mike Johnson asked whether people in the countries where oil's now being found should be excited or worried?

John Ghazvinian is the author of a book called Untapped: The Scramble for Africa's Oil.

Kwamena Adjei is an economist in Ghana's capital, Accra, and a former presidential adviser.

First broadcast on World Business News