It is difficult to kill a bad idea when a powerful body, such as the US Congress, is behind it. Even when there is no serious intent, they keep it lingering on so that it may be used for purposes other than its original intention.

A friend recently brought to my attention, a Bill in the US Senate titled Support for Iraq Oil Trust Act 2009.

The purpose is: "To require United States government representatives to present to the government of Iraq a plan to establish an oil trust."

As an Iraqi and observer of the oil scene in particular, I am not surprised as the US, since its occupation, has been persistently more concerned about Iraqi oil than even the Iraqi government itself.

But all to no avail considering the dismal state of the industry and the decline it suffered since the occupation where production is down, refining is down, exports are down and imports of petroleum products continue at an enormous cost to the country.

The above proposal is not actually new. It was first proposed by Hillary Clinton and John Ensign in an article in the Wall Street Journal in 2006 and then reworded and introduced in 2007 as a Bill, read twice and referred to the foreign relations committee, carried to September 2008, read and referred and now also read and referred.

On the Congress site and Washington Watch site no body bothered to comment on it but people visiting the second site voted 70 to 75 per cent against the Bill and rightly so.

So what will the old-new proposal do for the Iraqis? It advocates that every Iraqi will get a direct benefit or "share" from Iraq's oil revenue. And the "sense of Congress" is that oil revenues are at the heart of political reconciliation and that direct benefit for individuals is critical for the process.

The direct stake would give Iraqis a "responsible and transparent management of resources and use of revenues", diffuse concentration of power to reduce corruption, alleviate incentives for smuggling and sabotage, reduce reliance on local and central government and serve as a model to other resource rich countries in the Middle East.

Soon enough, a market will be created and just like in Russia, we would have a wheeler-dealer who would buy the shares up front from needy Iraqis, make his billions and go off to buy a football team and live happily ever after.

The threats in the Bill are against the State Department because if it does not present the plan and assist in its implementation, then it will be gradually prevented from giving any economic aid to Iraq, thereby damning those the Bill was supposed to benefit.

The only example that comes to my mind which has some similarity to the proposed fund is the Alaska Permanent Fund where each year, 8 per cent of the state earnings from oil and gas are diverted to a fund but only 5 per cent is distributed to all Alaskans and the rest is invested in and out of Alaska. The fund was established in 1976 and it is valued now at $40 billion (Dh146.8 billion).

Only people with 12 months minimum stay and constant residency status in the state are eligible because it was designed to encourage living in Alaska, the difficult but beautiful state.

The sums disbursed to each resident ranged from $331 in 1984 to just over $2,000 in 2008. Therefore, the fund is more of an investment fund for future needs, when oil and gas run out, and similar to Norway's Government Pension Fund and Kuwait's Future Generations Fund.

The small population of Alaska, just fewer than 700,000 now, allows such distribution of money. There is no monetary disbursement in either Norway or Kuwait even though the populations in both countries are modest.

Iraq, with close to 30 million people, will not benefit from such populist schemes designed to weaken central government and development and means very little to the individuals.

At $50 per barrel, 2 million barrels per day exports and 10 per cent disbursement, I calculate that every Iraqi will get $10 a month.

Even if we distribute all the revenue, the result is not a substitute to sustainable employment in a country where potential far exceeds oil and gas resources no matter how important they are.

I wonder if Hillary Clinton is still in support and if any Middle East country is dancing to this tune.

- Saadallah Fathi is former head of Energy Studies Department in Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries Secretariat, Vienna