ERHE news...Reuters
Wed May 25, 2005 8:28 AM GMT+02:00
By Felix Onuah
ABUJA (Reuters) - Sao Tome and Nigeria expect to make a final decision on the long-awaited award of oil exploration licences at a meeting in Nigeria that began on Tuesday night, a Sao Tome official said.
A five-month delay in awarding five licences, located in a highly prospective offshore region in the Gulf of Guinea which is jointly administered by the two countries, has raised questions over the integrity of the process, Nigeria said.
"We hope this meeting will conclude our decisions for the award of the oil blocks," said Sao Tome Minister of Natural Resources Arlindo Carvalho. "We could not achieve this in earlier meetings because when we went home after a deep analysis we came to the conclusion that some things needed to be done," he added, without saying what.
Carvalho tendered his resignation last week, arguing that it was not possible to work in a climate of allegations of irregularities in the oil talks, but it was not accepted by President Fradique de Menezes.
Menezes sacked his petroleum adviser over the delays earlier in the month.
Sao Tome and Principe is located in the centre of the Gulf of Guinea off the West African coast, where several major oil discoveries over the last 10 years have turned it into one of the world's exploration hotspots.
A tiny and impoverished nation of 170,000 people, Sao Tome has been rocked by coup attempts and accusations of corruption as it prepares to become the latest African petro-state.
Nigeria's junior minister of foreign affairs, Abubakar Tanko, said the delays were eroding credibility in the licensing process.
"If we continue to allow extraneous factors to guide our thoughts and decisions it will seriously affect the bond of partnership," Tanko told reporters before the meeting.
The neighbours agreed to jointly administer the formerly disputed offshore area in a treaty signed in 2000.
LUCRATIVE RIGHTS
Sao Tome itself currently produces no oil, but geologists believe its offshore areas could contain giant new fields.
The United States hopes to import a quarter of its oil from the Gulf of Guinea region in a decade, from 14 percent now.
Some political forces in Sao Tome are not happy that a little-known U.S.-based company ERHC Energy has obtained preferential stakes in many of the blocks on offer.
President Menezes survived a military coup in 2003 by giving the military rights to oversee oil deals amid accusations of corruption. In May last year, four ministers were reshuffled in a political row over allegedly shady oil deals.
Last June, Sao Tome sacked two senior members of the joint development authority for unspecified reasons and nominated one of its citizens to replace a Nigerian at the head of the body. The authority released a statement in the same month saying bribery of licensing officials would not be tolerated.
The authority is currently engaged in its second licensing round for five oil blocks. The first round was aborted after awarding just one exploration contract, for $123 million, to a consortium led by U.S. giant ChevronTexaco.
The second round went through the bidding stage in December, receiving bids as high as $175 million, but the governments have yet to announce the winners and given no explanation for the delay. |
