A consortium of four civil society organisations (CSOs) has teamed up and issued a statement on the controversy surrounding the leaked addendum to a production sharing agreement (PSA) between Statoil and the government.
The consortium comprises Interfaith Standing Committee on Economic Justice and the Integrity of Creation, HakiMadini, Policy Forum, as well as Oil and Natural Gas Environment Alliance (Ongea).
The CSOs say this is in the public interest and stress that the State should refrain from endorsing such provisions in any future contract.
The new development has been prompted by revelations that the leaked document was missing the proposed profit sharing agreement.
“The shallow reaction from the government and non-reaction at all from Statoil leaves ample room for speculation and suspicions. The government reaction issued through a press release by Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation (TPDC) indicates that the terms of the said PSA are fair to the country quoting 61 per cent government take,’’ reads the CSOs statement in part.
The statement adds that the 50.5 trillion cubic feet could not have been discovered, hence attributing all discoveries to Statoil. This, in the consortium’s view, raises the question whether the deviation is a bonus to Statoil for the presumed achievement.
It also laments that the TPDC statement doesn’t provide information on the underlying economic rationale and assumptions applied to justify neither deviation from model addendum to PSA nor the actual terms of the signed PSA.
The lobby groups also charged that the conspicuous silence by Statoil on the matter threatens not only its corporate reputation and integrity but also that of the home country (Norway) as champion of transparency in the extractive industry.
In an early analysis of the StatOil deal, Dar blogger Ben Taylor argues that if the contract is fully implemented, the government could lose between $400 million (Sh672 billion) and a whopping $1 billion (Sh1.68 trillion) yearly.
Last week, Kigoma North MP Zitto Kabwe raised the red flag again over the StatOil/Exxon Mobil deal, claiming that it would cost the country a staggering loss of $55 billion (Sh92 trillion) should it sail through.
Mr Kabwe, who is also the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) chairman, said the loss, massive as it is, is just gross value calculated without considering factors such as inflation in the 15 years of the licence period.
His claim that is contained in a 15-page document, came up as another UK-based gas firm, British Gas (BG), announced last week that it had produced higher-than-expected flows of gas from a test well off the coast of Tanzania—boosting the financial viability of its planned liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal.
The Citizen
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